


Unintentional Observer

by laughter_now



Series: Unintentional Observer [1]
Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Angst, Five Times, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Jealousy, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-11
Updated: 2012-07-11
Packaged: 2017-11-09 16:03:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 31,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/457342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laughter_now/pseuds/laughter_now
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>5 Times Nurse Chapel thought it was just sex between Captain Kirk and Dr. McCoy, and the one time she realized it was actually love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 1.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own anything associated with the Star Trek Franchise. No money is being made with this story and no copyright infringement is intended.
> 
> Written in response to a prompt at the kinkmeme. First in the "Unintentional Observer"-'verse, which I also dubbed the "Capel-'verse".  
> First posted on July 26th, 2009.

**_Unintentional Observer_ **

**_1._ **

Christine Chapel was glad to be working on the Enterprise. It was the Federation's flagship, after all, and that alone was a great career opportunity and an honor to be part of. And it gave her the chance to work under doctor Leonard McCoy.

Of course she hadn't known him prior to that very first rescue mission they had embarked on. And back then he hadn't even been the designated CMO on board. But Christine had seen how he had taken charge after that first battle, when the whole ship had been thrown into chaos, and their assigned CMO along with other medical personnel had died in the fallout.

McCoy hadn't even thought about it, he had simply stepped up and taken charge, even before he had been officially named the new CMO, and Christine admired that. McCoy had held them together during that mission, when they had been trying to save as many of the injured as they could with a damaged and seriously understaffed medical bay.

So she had been thrilled to hear that McCoy had requested her explicitly when it came to staffing Enterprise's medical team for its first five year mission, and she hadn't regretted her assignment just once.

McCoy was tough as nails, but he was one of the best doctors Christine had ever worked with. He was still young, especially for a CMO, but unlike a lot of the older doctors he hadn't lost touch with the reality of running a functioning medical station even in times of crisis. A lot of doctors forgot that nurses were an integral part of keeping a ship's crew healthy and running, and not just there to fetch their coffee. Not so doctor McCoy.

He wasn't complimenting people left and right, and with his gruff demeanor it was hard to judge his mood at times. But he let his people know when they were doing a good job and even more importantly, that he relied on them. He didn't need to exceed much pressure or control over his staff because he didn't need to. Everybody was working the hardest they could under him, and nobody even thought about slacking. McCoy simply inspired that in his people.

No, Christine Chapel definitely enjoyed working on the Enterprise, and especially under Leonard McCoy. The fact that the man wasn't hard on the eyes was an added bonus, of course.

Not that Christine was secretly pining for him, or – even worse – making advances. She was too professional for that, thank you very much. But she was a single woman, and she wasn't blind. And McCoy was single, if admittedly a bit hardened by his divorce. They were working together on a daily basis, and five years was going to be a long time. Sometimes, appreciating the view while waiting for how things were going to develop was a lot better than trying to force things. She wasn't pining, but she definitely wasn't going to say no if the opportunity presented itself.

For now, they had a good working relationship, and the necessary trust needed for them to do their jobs right. And that was the main thing.

Unlike some of her colleagues who seemed to have a harder time figuring out McCoy, Christine knew that he was hiding a lot of soft spots underneath that gruff exterior – and that he wouldn't hesitate to give anyone who dared to say that out loud an injection of the most gruesome non-lethal extraterrestrial flu he could find. But no matter how gruffly he pretended that it wasn't so, Christine knew better. She knew, and for now that knowledge was enough.

And so it was with a smile that Christine went to work every morning. Most times, she and doctor McCoy were both on alpha shift, something that only changed when the occasional away mission or emergency crisis threw off the ship's normal schedules. And she believed she got to know her direct superior quite well over the first couple of months of their mission away from earth.

She learned that he didn't function and in fact didn't consider himself human without at least one large cup of hot, black coffee in the morning.

She learned that he hated using the transporter for away missions, but that he was even more loathe to go on a shuttle, although he had gotten very good at hiding it.

She learned that despite all his grumbling about the various members of the crew and all the _'moronic ways they thought up to get themselves hurt, maimed or infected with something'_ which McCoy seemed to take as a personal affront every time it happened, he respected each and every one of them for who they were and would rather chew off his own arm then let them die on his watch.

She learned that McCoy kept a PADD with his daughter's drawings in the top drawer of his desk, and that it was best not to disturb him when he took a few minutes after a treatment or surgery to look at them. She also learned that once a week he talked to his daughter if their current mission allowed it, and that he was extremely moody for hours after those calls.

In short, Christine Chapel learned a lot of things about Leonard McCoy that most other crewmembers had no clue about. She didn't feel special for knowing them, but she had the feeling that it made it easier for her to understand him. And it made them work more efficiently as a team.

But as it often happened when you got to know someone better, sooner or later you were bound to find out something you wished you hadn't known.

Maybe nine months in to their five year mission, Christine came into Sickbay a little while after her shift had ended. She had forgotten a PADD with some research on vaccines she was working on. There had been a lengthy away mission occupying them for the past week, messing with their usual schedules. Christine knew that McCoy was supposed to be on duty for the nightshift, but she had expected the room to be empty otherwise. Just half an hour ago there had been no overnight-patients, so she fully expected McCoy to be in his office, finishing up the day's paperwork.

The doors hissed open and Christine quickly strode through the empty room towards her desk just outside of doctor McCoy's office. The PADD she was looking for was lying right in the middle of it. It was just one quick grab, then she'd be out here and back in her quarters in no time. Her hand reached for the PADD, but stopped short when she heard a sound from McCoy's office.

She was glad she hadn't grabbed the PADD yet, because Christine was fairly sure that she'd have dropped it right that moment. It had been a moan coming from the doctor's office, and it had definitely been McCoy's voice.

Okay. She just needed to remain calm. This…this could have been practically anything, and she surely had no right to pry.

Heart beating fast in her chest, Christine stood rooted to the spot and thought of what to do next. She could simply grab the PADD and leave. No, she _should_ do that, no discussion about it. Maybe it had been a trick her ears had been playing on her anyway. But even if it wasn't, she had no business prying into what McCoy did when he was alone in his office. Everybody had their own way of dealing with a stressful day. And even if the day hadn't been particularly stressful, it was none of her business.

And maybe it wasn't…that, at all. Maybe the doctor had simply pulled a muscle, or just discovered he had a stiff neck from sitting hunched over his desk for so long. One single moan alone was definitely not enough of a basis to judge if it had been lustful or not.

Even if it had sounded decidedly lustful to her ears.

Christine had to admit that the thought was intriguing, and she couldn't help herself. It seemed her brain had short-circuited, unable to think of anything but what might be going on behind that door.

Another moan, this one longer and slightly muffled in an attempt to stifle it.

Definitely not a moan of pain, Christine was sure of that now.

She definitely wasn't pining over her boss in any way, but the sounds she had heard went straight into a part of her brain that forewent all rational thought in favor of imagination. McCoy definitely was an attractive man, and Christine would not object to hearing him sound like that when there was no wall and office door separating them.

And even though she knew she shouldn't do it, that it was an invasion of privacy and that McCoy would bust her down to ensign if he ever found out, Christine found her feet moving slowly towards the door instead of away from it. Heart beating fast in her chest, she walked towards the office door, stopping only when the sounds from inside became more clear. She could hear the sound of movement, the rustling of clothes and another moan, much louder and more distinct than the ones before. Christine took half a step back, shocked because she realized that the source of the moans had to be directly on the other side of the door, probably in the leather armchair McCoy had requested to be put there before they had embarked on their mission.

For a second, just a second, Christine entertained the thought of what would happen if she just gave a short knock and went into the office. It was what she usually did when she was on shift, unless the doctor had explicitly stated that he didn't want to be disturbed. There'd be nothing suspicious about it if she did just what she always did. Of course, if McCoy really was doing what she thought he was doing, her entrance was going to cause some embarrassment and awkwardness, but maybe…

"God Jim, not…not here."

Christine felt the floor drop from underneath her feet. _Jim_? There was only one Jim on board that she knew of, but for some reason the thought of doctor McCoy and the Captain…

"Relax, Bones."

And if she had needed any more confirmation, that would have been it. There was only one person who ever called McCoy that, and the voice had been unmistakable as well. It was the Captain who was in the office with the doctor. And was it the door between them, or had the Captain's voice sounded somewhat…muffled?

"Relax? I told you before Jim, not…not in here. Anybody could come barging in!"

McCoy's voice was laden with its usual gruffness, but his heavy breathing suggested that he was going to complain even more if the Captain stopped whatever it was he was doing. And really, how many possibilities were there as to what he could be doing? Not many, right. That's what Christine thought.

A few seconds passed during which Christine could have turned around and walked away. She had no explanation as for why she didn't, but the thought didn't even occur to her. When Kirk's voice sounded again, it sounded deeper than usual, and layered with something Christine had not heard in it before. If she had been forced to put a name on it, she'd have said this was what arousal sounded like when it was tinged with a hint of mischief.

"That's part of the fun. Come on Bones, you remember fun, right?"

"Yeah, an entry for misconduct in my file sounds like a damn lot of fun. Jim, I'm serious… _yes_! Hell, do that again! Right…right there, yes…"

Another moan, this one a clear sound of abandon and surrender of McCoy's protests, sounded through the too thin polymer of the door, and finally Christine snapped out of it and turned on her heel. Grabbing the PADD from her desk she quickly and silently hurried out of sickbay, her thoughts whirling.

McCoy and the Captain.

The doctor and…they were – they were what? She had no idea what to think of this, let alone what to call it.

Of course she knew that the two were close friends, but she had thought that was all they were. Close friends. Not…well, not that kind of friends, anyway. Definitely not. She had always pegged McCoy for the kind of man to take a relationship over causal sex any day, even after his marriage ended so spectacularly. And Captain Kirk…well. He was Captain Kirk. The man flirted with everybody on a regular basis, he hit on every woman he found attractive, and she definitely hadn't pegged him for the relationship kind of guy. Not at all.

So how did that go together?

It couldn't be more than a casual thing. For one, Kirk wasn't the type to go for more than that, and for another, she would have noticed if anything deeper had been going on between those two. She was working with McCoy day in and day out, of course she would have noticed.

Then what was it? Some kind of stress relief? Why the hell would McCoy turn towards the Captain if he needed that? Surely there were a lot of other people aboard this ship who would have jumped at the opportunity. People who weren't as flighty as the Captain. Christine knew she would have not said no either.

So why did McCoy turn to Kirk for that? True, they were friends, but he should see that this could only work out badly. Kirk would never stop his ways, and in the end it was the doctor who was going to get hurt.

And in a public place, no less. Well, semi-public, but still. As the doctor had said, anybody could have just walked in on them. She wasn't surprised that it had been Kirk's idea either, not at all. Everyone on board knew that his shame threshold as far as that was concerned was a _lot_ lower than that of the average person. Which is why Christine was convinced that something like this could only hurt McCoy in the long run, even if it was just about sex.

If someone caught them in the act and reported them, their careers could be over. Maybe not Kirk's because after his part in saving Earth he was Starfleet's golden boy. McCoy's career however would suffer seriously if they were ever found like this and reported by the wrong person, and Christine was sure the Captain didn't give a damn about that.

As she angrily punched in the code to access her quarters, she asked herself why she was letting this get to her so much. McCoy was only a man, so what if he had to let off some steam sometimes?

It wasn't fair, she decided as she dropped the PADD onto the table and threw herself onto the bed.

She really liked doctor McCoy, and she had put an effort into getting to know him. She wasn't pining over the doctor, but she had been ready and willing to give it time and see if there might be the chance of something developing between them. She had been investing herself.

And Kirk? All it took was one horny moment and Jim _'I can have everyone with a snap of my fingers'_ Kirk was on his knees in front of the doctor (because yes, considering what she had heard that was the _only_ possible explanation as to what had happened).

Admittedly, probably McCoy had played a part in that as well, but still. It wasn't fair, that was the only thing there was to say about it. It wasn't fair that some people got to have everyone they wanted, and that somebody who was willing to make an emotional commitment got overlooked.

Men.

Christine pulled out her pillow and pressed it over her face in frustration.

McCoy and the Captain.

She shouldn't be judgmental. After all, if it was what the doctor wanted, who was she to decide it wasn't good for him. But that wouldn't stop her from worrying, or from caring about doctor McCoy.

And if Captain Kirk came in for his next physical and she happened to be non-too gentle with him when administering a hypospray, it most certainly wasn't a sign of antagonism. Just a little reminder that there were people who cared for McCoy.

And maybe it would be a small revenge for the unfairness of it all.

Definitely nothing personal.

 


	2. 2.

_**2.** _

 

After what she had heard in McCoy's office that night, Christine tried to convince herself that it had been a one-time thing. After all, just the thought of the doctor and the Captain hooking up for anything more serious than some stress relief in a moment of weakness (fatigue, random horniness, whatever it had been) was ridiculous. Besides, McCoy had been married and was, by all appearances, as straight as they come. A one-time thing with a man she could understand somehow, even for a man who considered himself totally straight.

Especially on a starship, where the choice of partners was limited, anyway.

And it wasn't any of her business, Christine knew that. But that didn't mean it left her alone. Standing right outside the door while the Captain and her direct superior were having sex was…well, it wasn't something that easily left her alone. It also made the next shift she worked with McCoy more than just a little awkward. Hearing the voice she had heard moan in abandon the previous night calmly ask her for a hypospray, or gruffly tell her to update Ensign Walter's file on the latest treatment, was more than just a little disconcerting.

She couldn't get the fragments of dialogue she had heard the previous night out of her head. Not to mention the altogether far too vivid images her mind had conjured up to go along with said dialogue. Christine barely looked at her superior officer for the entire morning, afraid that if she did she was going to blush profusely (and wouldn't that be embarrassing), or worse – say something that would make him suspect she had been listening in on his tryst with the Captain. And there was nothing Christine wanted less than for McCoy to find out she had heard. After all, she hadn't eavesdropped intentionally. Well, not at first, at least.

She couldn't shake the feeling that if McCoy only looked at her closely enough, he'd read her behavior for what it was and would know immediately that she knew. And that just wouldn't do. They had a great working relationship, the notion that Christine was snooping into his private affairs was going to ruin that. And that was something she absolutely couldn't risk. So maybe it was paranoid, but she was afraid that if the doctor only looked at her closely enough, he'd _know_. So she tried to make herself as inconspicuous as possible, hoping that alpha shift would prove a busy distraction.

It took nearly the entire day until she dared to look into McCoy's eyes again without being worried that he might somehow be able to see that she had been listening in on them.

And of course he didn't. He frowned once or twice when Christine scurried to work like an overzealous second year resident, or when she kept staring at the unchanging readouts on her tricorder instead of look at him while he was talking to her, but she hoped it didn't look any more suspicious than the occasional odd day everybody just had at one point. And she thought it worked just fine. McCoy had seemed a little surprised at her slightly odd behavior, but he hadn't pried. It was something she had always considered a good part of how he handled his station – that he didn't pry into people's personal affairs as long as they didn't concern their work or efficiency.

After what she had heard, however, there had been moments when Christine would have been glad if he had asked her about it. If only so that she could ask him _why_ , and what the hell had he been thinking hooking up with the Captain of all people.

But all of her personal thoughts and doubts on the wisdom of this particular decision aside, it was none of her business, and McCoy didn't ask. So Christine did her best to forget it had ever happened and just get her work done in a manner that would lead to no complaints. It was tense for a few days, but it got better. Especially since Christine took great care not to come unannounced into Sickbay when she wasn't on duty and knew that McCoy was supposed to be handling gamma shift alone.

She could deal with what she had seen (or rather, what she had heard and imagined rather vividly), and she didn't particularly care for a repeat performance.

And though she'd never admit it out loud, Christine was glad that her job didn't require her to work in the constant presence of Captain Kirk. She had a lot of respect for doctor McCoy, and it would take more than just an overheard act of intimacy with what she considered an odd choice of partner for her to lose that respect.

Which didn't mean she held no respect for the Captain, not at all. She did. She trusted in the Captain's ability to command this ship, and to always do his best to make sure they all came out of every mission safely. She had a lot of trust in James Kirk. Just…not in his ability to commit. Or not to ruin what she perceived to be a great friendship (one that seemed to mean a lot to McCoy, by the way) just because he couldn't always control his sexual urges.

And yes, Christine was well aware that it always took two for that kind of thing, and that what she had overheard hadn't sounded particularly one-sided. But she knew doctor McCoy. She knew that he had those occasional bouts of loneliness that he wasn't as adept at hiding as he thought he was. And she knew that he was loyal to boot, and that he had a soft spot for the Captain that was about as big as Klingon Space.

He surely had a part in whatever it was that had happened between them, but Christine was willing to bet a bottle of Romulan Ale that it had been Kirk who had started it.

She had a right to be concerned. After all, if this thing was ever going to affect McCoy's work, they were all in a whole lot of trouble. So what if she was biased? That's what happened when you cared about someone. And Christine Chapel most certainly cared about doctor McCoy.

So yes, Christine would be lying if she said that the whole thing didn't keep her mind occupied for days after she overheard the two. But there was no other incident after that, and soon things returned to normal. Of course, that didn't mean she didn't look more closely now whenever she saw the Captain and his CMO interact.

But during the few instances when she was able to observe them – at mealtimes, or when the Captain came by at Sickbay to talk to the doctor – nothing seemed to be any different from how it had been before what Christine had termed _The Incident_.

During meals the two either sat in amicable silence, or talked about normal everyday-business as far as she could tell. And whenever the Captain came down to Sickbay, it was either on official business (though thankfully not due to any injuries, doctor McCoy was always unbearable for days whenever _that_ happened), or for a quick private chat, an opinion, or simply to get away from the bridge for a few minutes.

Christine wasn't eavesdropping, but the snippets of conversation she was witness to were no different than those she had overheard multiple times before. Teasing, banter, some grumbling on McCoy's part, nothing that hinted at the fact that sexual activities were on those two men's regular agenda. No hint at all that there was anything other than friendship between them.

So Christine allowed herself to relax about the whole issue. A one-time thing, maybe two or more times. Just sex. Nothing that had put a strain on their relationship, either professionally or personally. Which meant things were perfectly normal again, and that meant Christine could go on about her daily business as usual again and could push the events of that night to the back of her mind.

She should have known, the moment she came to that conclusion, that it couldn't be that easy. Life never was.

It lasted all of four weeks, then _The Fight_ brought the memories of _The Incident_ come rushing back with renewed force.

Admittedly, Christine had only heard about the fight and not witnessed it herself, since it had happened in the bridge ready room. There had been a meeting between the senior officers about their newest mission. Christine didn't know what exactly had gone down, but the bottom line was that Kirk and McCoy had had different opinions on how to approach the mission. Now, them having a different opinion on whether Kirk should just rush headfirst into danger and let McCoy patch him up later on were nothing new, but this time it had allegedly come to a head. And not the kind of head she had witnessed in McCoy's office. The other kind.

Of course Christine wasn't privy to details, but their mission involved warring factions on a planet and very hostile peace-negotiations, and the atmosphere on the ship had been understandably tense since the command that they were to oversee these negotiations had come in. In the ready room, that tension had obviously exploded. Yeoman Jenkins had been about to bring some refreshments for what was anticipated a lengthy meeting, and she had involuntarily barged in to see Kirk and McCoy practically at each other's throat.

If her rendition was to be believed, the two had been standing mere inches apart, yelling at one another on top of their lungs. Christine knew that most probably the yeoman's report had been embellished and added to every time she or somebody else had told it. It must have been. The Captain and his CMO yelling at each other was one thing. Ensign M'tk'ala's rendition over lunch that he had heard Kirk had grabbed McCoy by the lapels of his shirt, pushing him against the ready room's wall as he gave him a dressing down of epic proportions was already slightly less credible. And crewman Lavenga's story that as far as she had been told Kirk had threatened to maroon the doctor in an evacuation pod if he didn't, quote, _'shut the fuck up right now_ ', was a total fabrication as far as Christine was concerned.

But fact was, there had been a fight that had been witnessed by someone outside the senior officer's ranks, and that had gossip on the ship going like nothing else. Christine didn't know what exactly had gone down, which whispers over lunch and which stories told hastily in passing to believe. But judged by McCoy's unearthly mood when he had returned to Sickbay after that meeting, she was definitely willing to believe Jenkins' statement that Kirk had pulled rank on McCoy to shut him up.

Which wasn't much better than a physical altercation or the threat to maroon an officer in empty space, at least as far as the strain it put on their relationship was concerned. Kirk pulling rank on McCoy was something Christine had witnessed before, but under totally different circumstances. It was one thing if it happened in a discussion just between the two, when they were of different opinion and Kirk wanted to have his way about something. The few times Christine had witnessed this happening, it had been nearly playful, Kirk reminding McCoy that as the ship's captain he had to listen to all his officer's concerns about his decisions, but in the end those decisions were his to make. And it had always been followed by McCoy's gruff, but secretly smug, reminder that as the CMO he was the only crewmember who could officially take Kirk off duty if he thought the Captain's decisions were too risky.

Pulling rank in a private evaluation of risk and gain was one thing.

Pulling rank in front of the assembled senior officers of the ship (plus one very overwhelmed yeoman), was in a whole different league.

Kirk had officially put McCoy in his place, publicly. More publicly than intended, because Christine was sure all this would have never left the ready room had it not been for yeoman Jenkins' unexpected entry. What could have been a slight humiliation of the ship's CMO had now become _the_ source of gossip all over the ship.

McCoy, to state it plainly, was as pissed off as Christine had ever seen him. The kind of pissed off where it was advisable to stay out of his way in the foreseeable future. Christine was more than willing to tell McCoy that she supported his standing up to the Captain in the situation, but she wasn't stupid enough to try. She definitely didn't want to be caught in the fallout of the worst disagreement on board since they had left for their mission.

In the end, Kirk had led their team down to the planet to oversee the negotiations with Spock, Uhura, Sulu and a security team, while back on Enterprise Christine had worked the worst shift of her life with a thoroughly pissed off McCoy. Then one of the factions had tried to sabotage the negotiations by planting a bomb, and things had gone worse from there. Chekov had found the bomb purely by accident as he performed a routine scan, the explosion had been prevented and nobody got hurt, but the negotiations were over before they had begun, and Enterprise was stuck in orbit until new orders from Starfleet arrived on how to proceed.

Kirk and McCoy were not talking to each other.

McCoy was a professional through and through, but he definitely wasn't able to keep his moods at bay when he was on duty. So working with him had definitely not been a fun experience these past two days. The doctor was curt with everybody on his staff, he was grumbling and mumbling to himself a lot more than was the norm even for him, and when Christine relayed an inquiry from the bridge to him one afternoon, she experienced herself that it was for the best not to mention Kirk's name in front of him. At least not if she didn't want to be caught on the receiving end of a rant about where exactly the Captain could stick last week's overdue report, in vivid and very descriptive detail.

For the first time since starting on the Enterprise, Christine didn't enjoy working in Sickbay, or under doctor McCoy.

That is, until Christine came into Sickbay this morning to find the doctor already there, wide awake and in a good mood, smiling at the crewman he was treating for a bout of ordinary Terran flu, and _whistling_ to himself as he administered the medication.

That last part had scared her a little.

McCoy was in a good mood and damn it, he was whistling, and after that barely tolerable last week Christine didn't know what to make of it.

It took her about five minutes to see the hickey.

It was on the right side of McCoy's neck, right underneath and not entirely covered by the collar of his shirt. It was a dark, purplish bruise that stood in stark contrast against his otherwise unmarred skin. The collar of his uniform shirt didn't really cover it, and whenever the doctor moved his head sideward or bend over like he did now while inspecting Ensign Porter's injured arm, it was plainly visible to anybody who looked.

Christine should be paying attention to what McCoy was doing so that she was ready in case the doctor needed anything, but she found she couldn't tear her eyes away from the bruise. She didn't even need to think about how McCoy could have gotten it. The doctor was an attractive man, but definitely not someone who used that to his advantage. In all her time on board, Christine had not heard about a single instance where McCoy had interacted with any crewmember on a level that was, if friendly or amicably, not strictly professional. Well, aside from that one instance which she had heard in perfect clarity a few weeks back.

No, Christine had no doubt that it had been the Captain's mouth which had sucked that particular piece of skin until the blood vessels underneath the surface broke.

She was no stranger to hikeys, definitely not. And she knew that only a horny and inexperienced teenager would leave a hickey in such an obvious place. Nobody else would. That is, not unless they wanted the hickey to be seen by everyone.

And that was what made Christine really angry. If the Captain and McCoy wanted to fool around, fine by her. As long as she didn't have to see it (or have a repeated audio performance), it was none of her business. But this was a mark that had been deliberately left in a place where everyone who came within a foot of the doctor could see it. It had been left exactly so _that_ people would see it.

McCoy dared to stand up to the Captain, out of concern for his safety and health, no less, and what did Kirk do? He pulled rank on him, risked his life anyway, got saved by pure luck and one overzealous ensign, and during their make up sex or whatever they called it, he left a mark for everyone to see?

Christine really had a high opinion of Captain Kirk as far as his professional capacities were concerned, but this was infantile, not to mention demeaning. And a very arrogant way to show who had, in his eyes, come out right in the end.

It was far worse than pulling rank on the doctor in front of the assembled senior staff of the ship.

Christine knew that McCoy must have been a willing participant, of course. But she wasn't so sure whether he saw the hickey the same way she did – a mark, and a claim. He probably didn't, otherwise he wouldn't be in this absurdly good mood. He was still _whistling_ , for crying out loud, even as he ran the dermal regenerator over Ensign Porter's arm and gave him the friendly advice to stay away from plasma outlets in the future.

It was disconcerting.

Just as disconcerting as the hickey, and Christine still couldn't take her eyes off it. When McCoy asked her to hand him a hypospray and she had to lean closer towards him, she could even make out darker bruising along the bruised neck where Kirk's teeth had left clear imprints in McCoy's flesh. Just the thought of how long and hard the Captain must have sucked and nibbled to create that kind of bruise…in the throes of passion probably (and _no_ , Christine didn't want to contemplate that any further, thanks a lot)… But still, Kirk had done it with the intent to leave a visible mark, and Christine was furious about that.

McCoy was a great and exceptionally loyal man, a medical capacity without whose dedication they'd have lost a number of crewmembers on this mission. He was somebody who should be held in high regard by everybody on board, and he definitely hadn't earned to be treated like a piece of cattle that needed to have its ownership marked. Especially not by one James T. Kirk, because without McCoy the Captain wouldn't even have made it this far. McCoy was the one who had brought Kirk on this ship in the first place, for one. And without McCoy's in times self-negligent devotion to his task of keeping the crew alive and in functioning shape, Kirk might not have survived a couple of previous missions in the first place.

If Kirk already felt the need to do something this infantile, then at least he should do it for the right reasons. Like pride that he was the one who got to do this when there were plenty of others who'd jump at that opportunity in an instant. Not to prove a point.

Kirk should be eternally grateful that someone as loyal and devoted as McCoy put up with him and his antics, and demeaning that by marking the doctor like that was anything but.

"Was it something I said?"

"Huh?" Christine snapped back to the present to find McCoy standing right in front of her, looking at her oddly. Ensign Porter was nowhere to be seen. She felt a flush creep up to her face and was instantly glad that the doctor held no telepathic gift whatsoever, considering the passionate defense of his virtue that she had just delivered to herself.

"Sorry doctor, what was it?"

McCoy raised his eyebrows. "I was just wondering if it was something I said. You just looked at me as if you were ready to murder me on the spot. Not a comforting thought with you standing this close to the laser scalpels, I gotta say."

Christine forced out a fake laugh. "Sorry sir, must have drifted off there for a moment. It's nothing."

McCoy regarded her for a second longer, then he shrugged. "All right then. Let's go prep the vaccines against Andorian Fever, we have half the crew scheduled for their inoculations this morning. Senior staff will be first to come get their shots."

Christine nodded and went over to the cooling unit containing their vaccine supply. Senior staff meant that the Captain was going to come for his vaccination, too. She picked up a hypospray and loaded a canister of vaccine into it with a little more force than necessary, inwardly reveling in the resounding click of the canister sliding into place.

That was fine with her. She might just teach him a little lesson about leaving marks on other people's necks.


	3. 3.

**_3._ **

 

It always surprised Christine how such a small ship crowded with over four hundred people could seem empty and deserted if one only went to the right spots at the right time. There was no lack of corners where one could hide away or get a few moments of solitude if one only sought it, and knew where to look. To her, it was one of the wonderful parts of working on a starship. Of course it had its annoying moments as well, but she was willing to take those in stride as long as the good sides by far outweighed the bad. Even if that meant she had to go out of her way occasionally if she wanted to be alone for once.

Only right now, she wasn't seeking solitude. In fact, all Christine Chapel was looking for was a shortcut.

It was nearing the end of her shift, and she was on her way back to Sickbay from a trip to Engineering. An accident had been called in, and since doctor M'Benga had been in the middle of treatment he had sent her over to Engineering to have a look. It had been nothing serious, just a blow to the head from a fallen canister. Not deeming the injury serious enough to require treatment in the medical bay, Christine had performed a scan, had treated the cut to the Lieutenant's head and sent him to his quarters to rest for the remainder of his shift, and to report back to Sickbay for a final backup at the end of alpha shift to be cleared for duty.

Now all that was left for her to do before her shift ended was to go back to Sickbay and see if doctor M'Benga needed anything else from her before she left. And the quickest way to get there from Engineering was through the Shuttlebay. It was the same route she had taken half an hour earlier, and just like then the area was deserted.

Not that the place was normally crowded with people, especially not towards the end of gamma shift, but today it was positively empty. There had been an announcement the previous day that Chief Engineer Scott and his crew were going to do some work on Shuttlebay's energy relays during the upcoming shift. Something to do with maximizing efficiency during depressurization, but Christine had to admit she hadn't really been paying attention to the technical details of the announcement. There had been other things on her mind at the time.

What mattered was that the area had been cleared of all non-essential personnel until the engineering work was done. And since there was no away mission that required the use of any of the shuttles, that meant right now nobody was there.

And it was just as well. Christine only wanted to officially end her shift, go back to her quarters, make herself a cup of tea and start on the new book she had downloaded from the archives. It had been a hectic week, with half of Sickbay's staff infected with an alien flu and quarantined in their quarters, leaving the remaining staff to pick up the slack. Christine had been working odd double shifts and wanted nothing more than to finally lie down and catch up on some rest, and later sleep.

The metal catwalks echoed hollowly under her Starfleet-issued boots as Christine walked along the upper gallery of Shuttlebay. She only needed to descend a set of stairs towards ground level where the shuttles were and leave through the bulkhead on the other side of the room, then she'd emerge right by the turbolift that would bring her to Sickbay.

Technically, she was not forbidden to come through here. The area was only off limits during the docking process when the bay was depressurized, or directly before and after the start and landing of a shuttlecraft. Nevertheless she knew that engineering personnel frowned upon non-engineering or security staff using the area for a shortcut, so she hurried to get through the room and back out again as soon as possible, before anybody could see her.

And it didn't look as if anybody was around. The large room was deserted and silent, and the shuttles were all docked in place, their interiors dark behind the narrow portholes. On her way through here earlier, Christine hadn't spared more than a fleeting glance to the crafts when she had passed them.  She had no interest in technical details, and to her shuttlecrafts only held an interest when she needed to board one. She cut through the space between two of the crafts just like she had done a little while ago on her way to Engineering.

Only this time, something made her stop.

She didn't know what it was. Maybe she had glimpsed a flash of movement from the corner of her eye, or she had heard something other than the muffled sound of her own boots against the floor. She had no idea what it was that had made her stop, but she suddenly had the feeling that she wasn't alone in the vast room.

Something tightened in her gut, and for a second she contemplated calling security. But only for a second, then she shook her head and silently laughed about herself. Calling security to a deserted area she had no business being in, and just because she had a gut feeling, was going to make her the laughing stock of the ship, no doubt about it.

Besides, she had received Starfleet education. Just because she was a nurse and not a member of security didn't mean she had no clue how to take care of herself. Especially in a situation where there was no threat from outside. After all, they hadn't been boarded by anybody. Even if somebody was here in the room with her, it was just another crewmember, someone she knew and had seen before. There was no reason at all for her to worry.

Christine stood still for a moment and listened. Now that the sound of her steps had stopped she could definitely hear some other noise over the gentle hum of the engines. But she couldn't pinpoint its location, or even say what kind of noise it was. Her curiosity peaked, she stepped closer to the nearest shuttle and peeked in through the side porthole. Maybe someone was doing some unscheduled repairs on one of the crafts. Maybe Mr. Scott's team had started their work on the relays early. Or maybe Mr. Scott himself had decided to work on something, even though it was technically the middle of the night. It wouldn't be the first time, definitely not.

But as she pressed her face to the reinforced glass, her hand shielding off the glare from the overhead lights, she found the shuttle empty, its inside dark and with nobody anywhere in sight. Whatever the source of those sounds was, it didn't come from inside this shuttle. Christine turned around and walked over towards the second shuttle. She had been trying to pass in between them when she had first heard the noise, it was only logical to believe that its origin had to be around here somewhere. Inside either of the shuttles, most probably. Straightening up, she looked inside the small craft.

She mentally did a double take, and it took her brain a few seconds to catch up on what her eyes were seeing.

Contrary to the first shuttle she had checked, this shuttle was dimly lit. Some of the emergency lights were turned on, casting the interior into a dim glow. It wasn't lit brightly enough to be seen, let alone attract attention from the outside, but well enough to make out what was going on inside the shuttle.

In detail.

Life on a starship wasn't easy on romance, Christine knew that. Opposing shifts, shared quarters, she could imagine very well that it was hard to find an undisturbed place for a romantic – or sexual – encounter. So it shouldn't surprise her that one couple had taken the opportunity of a cleared out Shuttlebay for some private time, and it was none of her business anyway. As long as it didn't endanger the crew and nobody got hurt, it definitely wasn't any of her business where crewmembers met up to have some private time alone. It was their risk of being discovered, not hers. So Christine's first instinct was to turn away and leave as silently as she could.

But she was only human, and instead of doing the rational thing and leave, she took a step to the side, angling herself slightly so that the ceiling lights didn't reflect off the shuttle's porthole, granting her a clearer view inside. Her heart was beating fast in her chest as she craned her neck for a better view, she could only imagine what this had to look like should anybody else come into Shuttlebay at this moment.

It would certainly not do anything for her reputation if she was found ogling the secret sexual meetings of her crewmates. She knew that what she was doing was wrong, and that he'd have a hell of a lot of explaining to do should she get caught, but for some reason she couldn't stop herself. Curiosity simply got the better of her, and she couldn't help but take a closer look.

Christine could make out two bodies in the back of the shuttle, one of them stretched out over the seats, the other one lying atop of the first. It didn't take the medical expertise of having treated hundreds of patients in various states of undress for her to recognize immediately that it were two men she was seeing.

Christine was an open-minded woman and most certainly didn't care who slept with whom as long as it was consensual and nobody got hurt. It wasn't the twenty-first century anymore after all. It didn't matter if it were two men, two women, or a man and a woman who decided to enjoy each other's company. But suddenly she felt as if she was intruding, looking too closely at something that wasn't meant for her eyes to see. She should turn around and leave right now, and forget she had ever walked in on this. Yes, that was exactly what she was going to do.

But just as she was about to turn around, the two men shifted slightly on their precarious perch on the shuttle's seats. That movement angled them a slight bit more towards the porthole Christine was looking through. It was just a glimpse she caught, a glimpse at the side of a face, the line of a jaw, but it was enough to make the breath catch in her throat.

Suddenly, she knew _exactly_ who was inside that shuttle.

Christine worked with doctor McCoy day in, day out. Of course she recognized his face, even in the dim light of the shuttle, and half-turned away from her as he moved on top of the other man. There was no mistaking that it was her superior officer who was having sex right in front of her, and as soon as she realized that, she didn't need to see the other man's face to know who he was.

Still, Christine felt her heart give another double take when McCoy moved his head to the side and the Captain's face came into view. His eyes were half-lidded, mouth open in a silent _o_ , lips red and swollen as he tossed his head back, baring his throat to McCoy who immediately latched onto it and started kissing and nibbling his way down the captain's neck and along his collarbone. Kirk looked positively wanton, and every thought Christine might have had about turning around and leave retreated to the back of her mind, taking a much needed break along with rational thought and what was left of her common sense.

She had no idea why the Captain and the doctor would meet for a secret tryst in a shuttle when both of them were senior officers who didn't have to share their quarters with anybody. But then again she had already caught them in the doctor's office, so maybe she shouldn't be surprised at all that they retreated to a public place for some time alone. What did surprise her, and rightly so, was that she couldn't tear her eyes away. Christine would have never thought she had a voyeuristic streak, but she found that she could not look away from the display in front of her.

Neither man had noticed that there was somebody watching them. They were too engrossed in each other and what they were doing to notice the face pressed against the porthole looking down on them. McCoy kept moving on top of Kirk without the slightest hitch in the movement of his rhythm. It wasn't something she had ever contemplated before, but for some reason, Christine wasn't in the least surprised to see that McCoy was the one on top in this situation. Superficially it was a contradiction to their rank, and to what a casual glimpse at their friendship might reveal about their dynamics. But Christine found that she wasn't surprised at all to see the doctor move atop of Kirk.

And it was fascinating to watch the two men like this, far more fascinating than Christine would have ever thought it could be, if she had contemplated such a scenario. Which she hadn't, but still. While the men's position blocked the captain from her view nearly entirely, it granted her a full view of McCoy's broad shoulders, and the expanse of skin down his lean back, all the way to…well, to what Christine could only describe as one particular fine ass. Firm, muscular, and just the right size. It really was a pity that it was hidden behind those shapeless uniform pants for most of the time.

And not only his behind was nice to look at. McCoy was a good-looking man, that was not a new revelation for Christine. But she would have never guessed that was built _this_ well. Christine was fascinated by the shifting of muscles underneath his skin – in his shoulders as he grabbed for the back of Kirk's head and pulled him in for a rough kiss, down his back and sides with his heavily panting breaths and the sensual roll of his hips, and in his buttocks and legs as he thrust into Kirk's body, again and again.

It was…Christine didn't know if there were exact words to describe it. None she could immediately think of did the display in front her any justice, but it was the hottest thing she had seen in a long time. Maybe ever. Two absolutely stunning men writhing in passion, not knowing that they were being watched and thusly showing no inhibitions whatsoever, it was sending tingles all over her body.

And it was obvious that this was no romantic moment, and no tender lovemaking. It was a passionate encounter, driven by lust, want, and need. The two men were exchanging open-mouthed kisses, all lips and tongues and _teeth_ , kissing each other with force enough to bruise and leave their lips red and swollen.

Kirk had his legs hooked over the back of McCoy's thighs, pulling himself up every time McCoy thrust into him. His hands were scratching down the other man's back, raking blunt fingernails over smooth skin, fingers digging in so strongly that McCoy's skin turned white under the pressure, leaving red and irritated trails all over the doctor's back.

Had the Captain's fingernails been longer, McCoy would have had an awkward time trying to treat those scratches on his own come tomorrow morning. As it was, Kirk's nails left long red lines in their wake, and McCoy shuddered atop of him as he did so.

Christine didn't know when her shock upon finding the two of them like this had turned into intent, and admittedly somewhat lustful, fascination, but she found that she couldn't turn her eyes away from the heated encounter that was happening just a few feet away from where she was standing.

Separated by the wall of the shuttle she could not hear anything clearly. She heard the cacophony of moans and sighs all right, muffled through reinforced steel and titanium, but she couldn't hear the sound of skin slapping against skin, or the breathless words Kirk was muttering. Christine didn't have the ability to read lips, but when she watched Kirk's mouth move against the skin of McCoy's shoulder, she could not help but imagine the obscenities he was whispering. With McCoy above him and _inside_ him like this, there simply was no way it could be anything but hot encouragements and random syllables of pleasure.

For a second, just a second during which her brain detached itself from the scene in front of her, Christine wished it were her in Kirk's stead. She couldn't remember having had such an encounter before, wild passionate sex that made her let go of all inhibitions and allowed her to just let herself fall into the heat of the moment. And the thought of having such an encounter with someone as handsome and obviously skilled as McCoy caused a spike of heat to spread through her entire body and, irritatingly, made a sharp jab of jealousy shoot through her at the thought that Kirk could have all that while she didn't.

And Kirk looked as if he was doing just what Christine thought she would be doing in this situation – he let go of all inhibitions. His mouth was latched onto the side of McCoy's neck again. He seemed to have a thing for that particular spot, sucking right in the place where Christine remembered the hickey had been. McCoy's groan was clearly audible even outside the shuttle as Kirk's mouth moved there, and with a grin on his face Kirk sucked, kissed and bit a glistening trail from McCoy's neck to his shoulder, teasing the flesh underneath his mouth with teeth and tongue.

Their movements were getting more urgent now. Watching them, Christine had no idea how they even still managed to keep upright on the narrow shuttle seat. Kirk was clutching at McCoy with all his limbs, pulling him down onto him and into him harder and harder with his arms and legs. The roll of McCoy's hips became more intent and forceful, sweat pooling in the small dip at the base of his spine as he thrust into Kirk with increasing speed and strength. He seemed to be leaning his whole weight on his left forearm as he sneaked his other hand between their bodies, fingers trailing down Kirk's chest and stomach until the hand settled further down, the muscles in his arm twitching as he stroked…

Christine tore her eyes away and forced herself to take a few steps back from the shuttle.

She shouldn't be watching. It wasn't right. And not only because this were two of her highest ranking superior officers who could demote her at a moment's notice if they caught her watching them. No, she shouldn't have been watching because McCoy and Kirk had come here to be alone, not to be watched. Maybe the thrill of someone possibly catching them in the act had played a part in bringing them here, but thrill didn't equal desire to be watched.

Christine turned around and determinedly started walking towards the door that would take her out of Shuttlebay as quickly as possible. The sounds from inside the shuttle faded quickly as she stepped away from the shuttle. She was breathing harder than normal, but she put that up to her quickened pace. That was her story, and she was going to stick to it. It would be hard enough looking either McCoy or the Captain in the face again, _ever_ , after seeing this, she didn't really need to contemplate the fact that it had aroused her more than she cared to admit.

She really needed to get a grip on herself. She had known before that McCoy and Kirk were having sex, it wasn't as if this whole thing had come as a surprise. She had even _heard_ them before. Now she had seen them. It was just a moment of stress relief she had witnessed, a physically intimate moment that had nothing to do with emotional commitment. It had just been sex, a natural, physical act. Christine was a nurse. Natural, physical things she could deal with.

She was going to clock out at Sickbay and return to her quarters, where her tea and book were waiting for her. No difference to her initial plan at all.

But as she stepped out of the Shuttlebay, an inaudible sigh of relief escaping her as the bulkhead slid close behind her, Christine wished for the first time that instead of sonic showers Enterprise was still equipped with old-fashioned water showers.

She could really do with a very, _very_ cold shower right now.

 


	4. 4.

**_4._ **

 

A camping trip.

Christine had always known that as a nurse, her main field of work was going to be Sickbay. It was her job to help treat the injured and sick on the ship. But everyone who signed up with Starfleet knew that at one point they'd be part of an away mission, leaving the relative safety of the ship behind to explore a previously unknown world, or to lend help in a possibly hostile situation.

Like every cadet in training and later on during her education at Star Fleet Medical, Christine had imagined what her first away mission would look like, more often than she was willing to admit even to herself. She had mentally played through different scenarios where she as part of the medical team would be asked to join an away team. In her imagination, there had been medical emergencies, outbreaks of contagious diseases or the need to lend aid after armed conflict had taken place.

Realistically, she hadn't expected the first away mission she became part of to be something heroic.

What she had never envisioned, however, had been that her first away mission was going to be a _camping trip_.

Because no matter how the others called it, there was no denying it for what it was.

It was funny, seeing that the idea of sleeping in a tent hadn't even occurred to her when she had first heard about the mission. A thus far unexplored Class M planet had grabbed their Captain's attention. Only half as big as Earth, it was located at just the right distance form the system's sun to ensure the growth of a rich flora and fauna. There were no indigenous sentient inhabitants other than the normal wildlife, nobody to make first contact with, but the Captain had decided to investigate the planet further. Starfleet was constantly establishing new outposts on Class M planets all over the galaxy, so every previously unchartered planet that filled the requirements had to be investigated further.

Actually, the reason why Christine found herself as part of this away mission was doctor McCoy.

When the science department had finished their first detailed scans of the planet, the doctor had immediately conferred with Spock and then had requested to send a medical team along with the usual away team. It was a very sound decision that showed a lot of foresight, Christine thought.

After all, they were on a mission that was possibly going to keep them away from earth for years, barring unforeseen circumstances. There wasn't always a spaceport within reach, and not all species they encountered were willing to provide provisions with a Federation crew. They could synthesize a lot of medication thanks to the information in their database, but the Enterprise was constantly discovering new worlds, new species and new threats. It was a very rational decision to take the discovery of a new planet with a thriving wildlife as an incentive to investigate the resident flora for its possible medical use.

So as soon as McCoy had read the science department's report on the unusual properties of some of the plants discovered on the planet, the doctor had insisted to be part of the away team to do further research on site. And he had picked Christine to accompany him and help him in the research.

Now, Christine took that as the compliment she knew it was to her professional qualities, and she couldn't help to be excited about going planetside. For one, it was an opportunity to get away from everyday business on the ship, a chance to help the doctor with his research and analysis. And the fact that she got the chance to go on this mission with doctor McCoy was an added bonus as far as she was concerned.

One that nearly made up for the fact that it turned out to be nothing but a glorified camping trip, and Christine hated camping. As a member of Starfleet she was definitely used to a lack of comfort in her daily living arrangements. But that didn't mean she had to embrace the total lack of _any_ kind of comfort and civilization as something exciting. Humanity hadn't strived for more comfort and better civilization for millennia just to give all that up voluntarily. It was taking a huge leap backwards, and shouldn't they be going forward instead of back?

Christine liked nature just as much as the next woman, but she didn't need to sleep right in the middle of it, separated by nothing but a thin sheet of insulated polymer-fabric, thank you very much. Starfleet issue sleeping bags and mats were notoriously uncomfortable, made for insulation and survival and not for comfort, and Christine didn't even want to contemplate the number of alien bugs and other assorted little creepers crawling around just inches from her while she slept.

It was safe to say that Christine Chapel was not a fan of camping. At all.

The Captain, on the other hand, seemed to positively revel in the mission or, as he called it, their _'unofficial shore leave'_. He had been adamant about going planetside, something which had let to a discussion in the first preliminary mission meeting that Christine had found extremely entertaining.

Spock, in his typical Vulcan stoicism, had calmly pointed out that this mission did not require the Captain to be present. Kirk's reply that in case first contact had to be made, it was the task of the Captain to do so had been met with the rational assessment that the planet's largest indigenous creatures were mammals the size of terran pig who, by the results of their preliminary scans, would not particularly care if they were greeted by a Federation Captain or a simple crewmate. To Christine, that statement had been layered with an undertone of amusement, but she felt that must have been a trick of her imagination. Spock wasn't known for having a funny streak.

Eventually, Kirk had put an end to the discussion by saying that refusing to meet the locals himself just because they were pigs was specist, his cocky and self-assured grin which he always wore during moments like this firmly on his face, and Spock had relented with merely a raise of his eyebrow and a calmly stated _'of course, Captain'_. To Christine's right, McCoy had mumbled something about how if there was anyone who could bring out the maniac, carnivorous side in a normally harmless species of pigs it was Kirk, but the people assembled in the room had uniformly chosen to ignore that comment.

But in the end, that had settled it. Kirk was going on this away mission, because it wouldn't be a proper away mission if Captain Kirk wasn't first in line to get himself attacked, shot, beaten or otherwise mauled by thus far unknown alien dangers and predators. Even if said dangers seemed to consist of nothing but harmless pollen carried by the ever-changing winds on the planet, and knee-high mammals that might or might not turn carnivorous at the sight of the Captain.

And before she knew it, Christine had found herself on a transporter platform along with the other members of her away team, nervously clutching her equipment pack and wiping the damp palm of her free hand against her trouser leg. Damn it, she was too old to be nervous about going on a harmless away mission which wasn't going to be more dangerous than a walk in the park.

One rather disconcerting dematerialization later, she had found herself standing in a grassy plain with the system's sun shining down on her face and a slight breeze pulling at her hair and clothes. She hadn't even known how much she had missed the outdoors after months spent on a starship, and for a few moments Christine simply stood there, eyes roaming the landscape around her as the let the wind pull at her and breathed in fresh, clean, sweet-smelling air that hadn't been run through filters and air-processors hundreds of times.

The pure enjoyment only lasted for a few seconds, then McCoy's gruff voice tore her out of her momentary state of relaxation and they went to work.

While a science team under Spock's lead was investigating a rock formation that had shown particularly interesting magnetic properties a few miles south, Christine's own team was tasked with collecting air, water, and soil samples as well as with the analysis of certain indigenous plants which Spock and McCoy had singled out previously for their medical properties. It was pleasant work in pleasant surroundings, and Christine found that she quite enjoyed herself.

Aside from Kirk, McCoy and herself, her away team consisted of Lieutenant Phreng from security, the obligatory redshirt who had to be part of all away missions, and who for the duration of this particular mission had been put under Christine's tutelage to help with their work. The young Denobulan was quick on the uptake, and she seemed to enjoy the change compared to her usual field of work.

And nothing much happened to interrupt their work for the next hours. Occasionally, Christine would raise her head at a rustle in the bushes, a sound at which Phreng's hand immediately went to the weapon holstered at her side, and an animal would peek out at the alien intruders. None of these animals displayed any signs of suddenly turning carnivorous at the sight of humanoids in general, and Captain James T. Kirk in particular. Not even the group of pigs that traversed at the edge of the nearby forest late in the afternoon. Christine guessed that meant they were safe from any kind of mishaps on this particular mission.

She kept working with Phreng for the entire day while Kirk and McCoy paired up to complete the other half of their scheduled work. And really, who was surprised by that? Christine wasn't going to raise her hand at that question, certainly not.

Besides, it was just fine like that. Although Christine wouldn't have minded working with McCoy. It was what she did on a daily basis, after all, and she was professional enough not to let anything she had seen deter her from doing her work. No, she was only glad that this arrangement put some physical distance between herself and the _pair_ of McCoy and Kirk. Because those two together, that was something she wasn't too sure she could handle without blushing profusely or making an ass of herself in some other way.

She had tried to get the images of what she had seen in the Shuttlebay out of her mind, she really had. She hadn't acted upon it in any way, hadn't talked to anybody about what she had seen. And really, that had been the hardest part. It seemed that no matter what she did, she just couldn't help but stumble over signs of evidence that Kirk and McCoy were friends with interesting benefits, and to make matters worse she had nobody she could talk to about it. It was no small wonder it didn't leave her alone, no matter how much she tried to push it out of her mind.

She needed someone to talk to about this, especially after watching the two men having sex in the shuttle – and _watching_ them it had been. Not _seeing_ them, because that would have meant catching a quick glimpse and then leaving as fast as she could. But she hadn't done that. No, she had stayed there and watched for as long as she dared, and it was so far removed from her usual behavior that she had no idea what to think about it all.

It was a frustrating situation, and the work outdoors was a welcome distraction from the constant buzz in her head.

She and Phreng worked diligently, and whenever Christine spared a glance to McCoy and the Captain, the two seemed to be just as engrossed in their work. So all was fine and well with this mission. Well, that is, all was well and fine until they called it a day and set up camp.

Christine had no idea why they couldn't simply beam up to the ship for the night but had to stay here and sleep in tents, but it was not her place to question orders when the Captain was present. And according to the Captain, staying for the night was _'part of the fun Chapel, lighten up'_. So that was that. She distantly wondered whether the part about lightening up had been an order, because she wasn't too sure it was one she could comply with.

They ate dinner rations sitting on the plain grass outside at their makeshift campsite. Spock had been adamant about pointing out that they weren't to use open fire on the planet's surface. The higher rate of oxygen in the air here combined with the dry spell of its summer season could easily lead to the outbreak of a quickly-spreading fire if they didn't pay attention. So when the sun set, they settled around one of the halogen lamps they had brought. At first the mood was a little tense. Phreng seemed subdued by the presence of the Captain, and Christine herself had seen far too much going on between the two men sitting beside her that she could _not_ ever talk about, so she kept silent.

Silence, however, was not something Kirk endured lightly, and soon he was entertaining them with stories from his days at the Academy. It seemed to work for Phreng, and soon she and the Captain were exchanging stories about training mishaps and who had been most clever about sneaking in and out of places they had no business being behind the instructors' backs. The evening faded out on a pleasant note, until all amusing stories were told and it was time to retreat to their tents and get some sleep.

Sleeping arrangements had been dealt with quickly, more of a side note on Kirk's part as they were setting up the tents.

He and McCoy were going to take one tent, and Christine and Phreng were going to sleep in the other. That way, each of the two medics was going to be paired up with someone who had received more than just basic security training, and all gender sensibilities were taken care of.

Yeah, right.

Christine had no clue why any of them would need the protection of a security officer. Not unless the fluffy indigenous wildlife turned absolutely maniac as soon as the sun set, which she somehow seriously doubted. And nowhere in Starfleet protocol for these situations did it say that sleeping arrangements had to be made according to gender. She could name five examples off the tip of her tongue where there had been mixed sleeping arrangements on previous missions.

And she had to admit that she wouldn't mind sleeping in the same tent as doctor McCoy, even if that meant she wasn't going to get much rest and relaxation, and would probably spend the entire night staring at the sleeping doctor's face. It would be one of the better sleepless nights, Christine was sure of that.

But it wasn't to be, as she had known right from the start, and Kirk was the one who had snatched the opportunity of sleeping just a foot or two from McCoy away from her. It didn't take a genius to figure out why Kirk insisted on those particular sleeping arrangement, at least not after what Christine knew about how their relationship occasionally strayed away from mere friendship.

Kirk delivered the decision about who was going to sleep where in such a nonchalant tone that at least Phreng didn't seem to detect any deeper meaning behind it. To be fair, Christine would have thought nothing of it too just a while ago, back before that night when she had first heard Kirk and McCoy from outside the doctor's office. But she had heard them, just as she had heard and seen all the other things since then, and so she didn't believe in Kirk's good intentions concerning security and gender sensibilities for just a second.

_Unofficial shore leave._

Those had been Kirk's words earlier on, after all.

Christine put away her things and retreated into the narrow tent to face the nigh-impossible task of getting some sleep and rest under pre-civilized conditions. The floor of the tent and the insulation map beneath her sleeping bag were entirely too thin, and as she settled she could swear she felt every stone, each and every twig and root dig into her back and legs. If they ever found themselves in need of a method of torture, Christine would gently suggest to just try and get some sleep with Starfleet equipment on an uneven surface.

She was uncomfortable, it was entirely too warm in the tent, and a strange insect was buzzing through the interior, bumping against the fabric of the tent repeatedly, creating an arrhythmic sound of _buzz_ and _bump_ that startled her anew every time it happened.

Oh, and the regulated maximum distance between tents, constituted by Starfleet for security reasons, was not distant enough. In fact, as far as Christine was concerned, the two tents were standing entirely too close to one another.

One of the peculiarities of the planet were the constant winds. No strong breezes, but a constant movement of air that changed direction without pattern or rules, sometimes blowing in the same direction for minutes while changing direction randomly the next. And of course just as she was about to settle for sleep, the wind blew from the direction of the officers' tent, carrying with it all the sounds of the two men settling in the tent next to Christine's.

And they did take an awfully long time to settle. Unlike Christine, the Denobulan beside her didn't seem to have any trouble with all the background noise. Phreng had been asleep the moment she had zipped up her sleeping bag.

Speaking of which, there seemed to be an awful lot of zipping to and fro going on in the other tent. Christine sighed in frustration. How hard could it be? Starfleet equipment was designed for easy and uncomplicated use, and nobody as experienced with away mission sleepwear and equipment should take that long to get settled…

Of course.

Christine really should have known.

Of course the sleeping bags could also be zipped together, to preserve heat or share body heat in case of an emergency. _Emergency_ being the keyword here,  but of course everyone had a different interpretation of that word. Kirk especially seemed to have a different and very unique interpretation to every rule in the book, so why should this be different? Struggling out of clothes they had quite demonstratively worn while climbing into the tent, and then proceeding to zip their sleeping bags together in the dark obviously did take the Captain and McCoy a little time.

Christine hoped and prayed that the darn winds were just going to change direction soon, or that they'd seize altogether. Spock had said something about the winds' importance for the planet's ecosystem during the mission briefing, but right now Christine found that she didn't particularly care whether or not the spores were going to carry to where they should to ensure next year's growth of vegetation. She just wanted to sleep in peace.

Glancing to the left, she could make out Phreng's relaxed body in the very dim light of their tent. The Denobulan's breathing was deep and even, face relaxed in sleep. Well, at least one of them was getting some rest.

"Been too fucking long."

Oh no. Please, not. Not _again_.

But the wind had carried Kirk's voice quite clearly over the few feet's distance between the two tents, and the gravely quality to his voice combined with the continuous sound of more zipping and rustling clothes left no doubt whatsoever as to what was going on in the other tent.

Christine got it, she really did. If this was some design by fate forcing her to confront and admit to the fact that she was attracted to doctor McCoy, she got it. Message received. Yes, she was _definitely_ attracted to the doctor, and she was ready and willing to admit that. What else did she have to do to make this stop, put it into song? Write crappy poetry about it? Because she was just about ready to.

She understood. She was attracted to her superior officer, was ready to wait and see what would develop between them, and the universe had nothing better in mind than to add insult to injury by repeatedly showing her that the man she wanted was sexually involved with somebody else. _Very_ involved.

She got the message, now could it please stop?

"Duty roster," McCoy replied to Kirk's remark, voice muffled against something. It took a moment for Kirk to respond, his voice breathless as if he had been deprived of oxygen in the meantime. No big mystery to solve here, even while talking the two of them sounded as if they weren't quite ready to stop kissing entirely.

"You _make_ the roster, Bones."

God, those winds even carried the sound of McCoy's long suffering sigh.

"Told you, Jim. When M'Benga's got alpha, I gotta take gamma." A pause during which Kirk moaned. Loudly. "Can't let Chapel take every nightshift." Another pause, this one blissfully silent. "Can't leave any of the other nurses without a doctor in attendance."

Christine knew that McCoy thought highly of her, on a professional level. She did. And admittedly it was good to hear that he felt comfortable giving her responsibilities he didn't give to any of the other nurses.

But really. _Really_. She had blissfully lived without knowing that she was part of McCoy's and Kirk's pillow talk. If McCoy wanted to let Kirk know that she was the only nurse who could be left manning the main sickbay alone with a doctor on-call but not present, he should write it in a report to let the Captain know. Not tell him while they were using an away mission as a means to get some undisturbed alone time.

And still the winds didn't let up, so even as the conversation in the adjacent tent fell silent, Christine still got the full audio track of what Kirk and McCoy were doing. Phreng slept on, blissfully ignorant.

After a minute or two of steady moaning, gasping and sighing, Christine had had enough. She pulled the pillow out from under her head and pressed it over her face. But like all Starfleet-issue equipment, the pillow was just about adequate to keep her head an inch above ground. It wasn't long enough to allow her to cover both her ears, and even if it had been, it wouldn't have been thick enough to muffle the sounds of the passionate coupling from the other tent, anyway.

She contemplated whether she'd be able too deprive herself of oxygen long enough to pass out if she kept pressing the pillow over her nose and mouth for long enough. The option started to seem more and more appealing. Of course, if she wasn't careful she might suffocate herself. It would be rather unfair to leave Phreng to discover her body tomorrow morning. And then there was the small matter that if she did, doctor McCoy was going to perform an autopsy on her, which was going to be more than just awkward. Well, not for her, because she'd be dead by then, but still. Also, she'd be dead and _naked_ , and that just wouldn't do. Neither would going out with her file stating that she died from self-inflicted suffocation. Besides, there was a root digging into the back of her head now that the pillow was gone, and it was giving her a headache.

With a sigh, Christine put the pillow underneath her head again and accepted her fate. After all, the winds could turn any minute, and then all would be blissfully silent. Or she would simply fall asleep despite the constant noise.

But of course Christine didn't just fall asleep. The loud and unashamed moaning and repeated sighs and exclamations the likes of _'do that again'_ , _'want you'_ and _'yes, right there'_ had something to do with it, she was fairly sure of that.

The winds didn't turn, either.

Phreng peacefully snored on as Christine learned a multitude of things she had _never_ wanted to know about her Captain and her CMO, and what exactly they were up to when the duty roster had kept them apart for a while. And if she had thought that this enforced break was going to make sure that Kirk and McCoy weren't going to be at it for long, she was sorely mistaken. There was some serious stamina involved there, but Christine was too tired and frustrated to acknowledge that.

Unlike the other things which she couldn't help but acknowledge.

Kirk was loud in bed, and fairly vocal. Which didn't really surprise her, but in her current situation annoyed her to no end. McCoy was nowhere near silent, either, but compared to Kirk's vocalism Christine considered his level of noise a reprieve. It was late at night and she just wanted to curl up on her lumpy sleeping mat and sleep.

At one point, just as _'vocal'_ was about to turn into _'I've had enough, I'm gonna go over there with Phreng's phaser and stun them both'_ , McCoy actually shushed Kirk. Thoughts of marriage proposal that were born out of sheer relief and not from any kind of romantic thoughts flittered through Christine's head, but the relief was short-lived.

"Wind's coming from the other direction," Kirk panted. "They can't hear us."

Kirk was responsible for leading their ship into battle, but he couldn't tell which direction the wind was coming from. Christine didn't know whether to laugh, or to request an immediate transfer as soon as she got back to the ship.

The winds changed, eventually. But not before the sounds from the tent next to hers went into a final crescendo, McCoy's moans and Kirk's exclamations blurring until they became one indistinguishable sound. On any other occasion, it might have been an arousing experience to listen in on them, without having to look over her shoulder for fear of being detected. On an occasion when there were no roots digging in her back, and when she wasn't so tired that she could sleep for a week if only she'd finally be able to get to it.

But Christine was tired. Beyond tired. She was exhausted, it was the middle of the night and she was going to have to get up again in less than four hours. Now was neither the time nor the place to lie here and listen to James Kirk having and enjoying the one thing Christine really wanted, but could not have. The one person Christine wanted.

When finally, blissfully, the adult entertainment soundtrack in the adjacent tent stopped and was replaced by murmured talking and, a little later, the sound of soft snoring, the winds finally turned.

Of course.

And to the sound of the wind blowing against Phreng's side of the tent, and the gentle buzz and bump of the large insect that was still trying to find its way out of its captivity, Christine Chapel finally fell into a dreamless sleep.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

The next morning, Christine woke up tired, disgruntled and definitely not in a good mood. She didn't look at Phreng, the one who had been able to sleep through it all, and she definitely didn't so much as glance into the direction of McCoy and Kirk. They might act like Captain and CMO this morning, having gotten all the accumulated sexual tension out of their systems the previous night, but Christine wasn't about to forget. Not anytime soon. She only hoped that the day was going to pass quickly so that she could get back to the ship and catch up on some sleep.

After breakfast, McCoy and Phreng went to collect water samples from the nearby stream. While they were gone, the winds turned again, and not even a minute later Kirk was going into mild anaphylactic shock in reaction to one of the airborne pollens the wind blew towards them.

Of course Christine felt sympathetic when the Captain slouched down on the ground beside her, struggling to breathe. But it was no life-threatening problem, and Christine still didn't feel particularly forgiving for what she had been through the previous night. She loaded the necessary medication into a hypospray, and admittedly she wasn't all that gentle when she pressed the hypo against the Captain's neck and injected the medication into Kirk's bloodstream.

The Captain's startled yelp was music to her ears, but Christine was never going to tell a soul about it.

And really, he could breathe again now. And contrary to her, Kirk seemed well-rested despite his nighttime activities. He really had no reason to complain.

 


	5. 5.

**_5._ **

 

Christine had no idea how it had happened. Sometimes, life just had a way of throwing you a curveball when you least expected it, to use an old earth sports metaphor. And couldn't Christine testify to that, what with everything she had run into over the past months, always when she least expected it, and always when she had just been about to forget the previous incident.

But this wasn't about Kirk and McCoy.

Only, it was all about them, but in a completely different way, one that somehow put all those previous instances into perspective. And Christine had no idea how the hell all that had happened.

It had started out as a normal mission. The Enterprise had been on their way to Henon IV, a planet in a small system near the border of the Neutral Zone, to establish contact and negotiate a possible joining of the Henonians to the Federation. Christine didn't keep up to date with the everyday politics of keeping the peace in space, but she knew how much an ally that close to Klingon space was worth, especially if it was an ally as highly technologized as the Henonians were. Only, allies had to be won over, and they needed to be dealt with carefully lest they turn into enemies. And that was exactly why Christine had become a nurse, and not a diplomat – she didn't want to bother with things like cultural differences, and how something that seemed normal by human standards might offend the member of another species gravely. When somebody got hurt, Christine knew how to put them back together. The human body was something she was familiar with. Politics were not.

So she didn't understand what exactly had gone wrong, but she knew that something definitely had. Seriously wrong.

One moment, they had been on the way to enter peaceful negotiations with what was assumed to be a neutral if not friendly species.

And the next thing she knew, Sickbay was overflowing with sick Henonians, doctor McCoy was running himself into the ground trying to figure out what was wrong with them, and the Henonians were keeping the Captain prisoner on the planet until he did.

Negotiations were totally off the table under these circumstances.

As it turned out, Henonians might be highly technologized and developed, but that didn't mean they didn't have strong religious beliefs. And coincidences could be a total bitch.

In this particular case, the damning coincidence had been that a large number of Henonians had started falling sick around the time of Enterprise's arrival. Inter-species encounters always bore the risk of transmitting previously unknown illnesses during early encounters, but Christine knew that this wasn't the case this time. That's what decontamination filters were there for, after all. And if their scans of the sick Henonians had shown one thing for certain amongst the mass of confusing data, then it was that the illness hadn't been brought to the planet by the Enterprise or any of its crewmembers.

The problem was, the Henonian leadership wasn't exactly open to that explanation.

It turned out that Henonians were a deeply religious species, despite all their technological advances. Their society was built around an age-old list of prophecies.

The real problem was that Henonians were a species who knew no natural illness. They didn't get sick.

And when the arrival of the Enterprise had coincided with the outbreak of a sickness, something that was unheard of in their entire history, one of the Henonian High Priests had declared that this marked the arrival of the _Sch'tal'tkar_ , which pretty much meant a plague that would end Henonian civilization, if Christine had understood Uhura's explanation during the briefing correctly. According to scripture, there were only two ways to stop the impeding apocalypse on Henon IV. The first was to force the one who had brought on the plague to reverse it. The second, if less preferred, method was to kill the one who had started the outbreak, sacrificing those who had already been infected in favor of saving those who were still healthy.

The Captain, as the perceived leader of the humans who had come to their planet, had been singled out as the one responsible for the plague on Henonian society. So according to the prophecy, he either had to make it undone, or he would be the ritual sacrifice that would appease the gods and save the Henonian race.

It was a twisted logic, but it had all happened so fast that nobody had been able to react.

Only moments had passed between the High Priest's interruption of the first negotiation meeting and a short-lived fight at the end of which the Captain and Lieutenant York from security had been taken captive. In fact, from all Christine had heard Kirk had surrendered to prevent anybody from getting hurt in what he had probably believed to be a simple cultural misunderstanding.

It was diplomatic, Christine had to grant Kirk that. It had probably saved the lives of a number of members of the security team whose sole purpose was to protect their Captain from harm during an away mission. And it had bought them time to assess the situation and find a way to get the Captain and Lieutenant York out of this alive.

But the only way to do that was to find a cure for the ill Henonians. And in order to prevent the sickness from spreading further should it prove contagious, all the sick Henonians had been beamed aboard Enterprise and were currently under quarantine in the ship's main Sickbay, where a more and more desperate and exhausted medical team was going to its limits in order to keep them alive.

The first step had been to figure out what had caused the illness. McCoy had determined early on that it was a microorganism, a microscopic parasite that had infected the victim's bodies, settling in their blood and major organs.

Nobody had any idea where the microorganism had come from, and why it had infected the Henonians now of all times, and not earlier. Only when one of Spock's planetary scans discovered the site of a recent meteorite impact and it showed that all those who were infected had either lived or worked close by the impact site did they find an explanation. The meteorite had torn through layers of rock and fossilized sediment, tearing open a huge hole in the ground and setting free the parasites that had been trapped underneath the planet's layers of impermeable rock for thousands of years.

Knowing what was causing the illness was one thing. While Spock and a crew from Engineering were working on a way to contain the contamination planetside so that nobody else would get infected, McCoy and the medical team faced the near impossible task of curing the illness.

They had to find a way to kill the microorganisms without doing further damage to the Henonians' already strained systems, and that wasn't even the hardest part. McCoy, for all his grumbling and pretence that every patient entering his Sickbay was part of a ploy to make his life more difficult, was a very good doctor. A dedicated doctor. And one of the things that made him that was that he cared about his patients, even the ones who were forced onto him under threat.

There wasn't much knowledge to gather about the Henonians in Starfleet's database, and they were all flying blind in trying to administer treatment and find a cure. Christine knew that she wouldn't have been able to do so, not under this pressure. Treating sick people was her job, her chosen career.

Finding cures for unknown sicknesses in order to treat a species about whose bodies and metabolism they knew next to nothing, with the life of their Captain at stake if they failed? This wasn't Christine's job.

But it turned out to be McCoy's calling, and Christine could only look on in amazement. How he was able to detach himself from all the personal entanglements of the situation, from thinking about _what ifs_ and what was at stake she had no idea, but he did. It was a near visible process how McCoy let go of all that and focused on nothing but the task at hand.

At first Christine tried to follow on what the doctor was doing. She wanted to understand, to be able to give input when it was needed, but it was a lost cause.

She was able to understand the full-body scans of the Henonians, and the extraction of blood and tissue samples of both infected and uninfected parts of their bodies. They needed to learn as much as they could about both, the Henonians' physiology as well as the parasite, so Christine fully understood that.

By the time McCoy started talking about protein sequencing and targeted radiation, she began to realize that this was getting way over her head. Then McCoy buried himself behind the microscope, emerging only for regular calls to the science department which Christine couldn't even try to understand. She finally stopped trying to understand what the doctor was trying to do and chose to simply act as she was needed.

She became McCoy's link to what was going on in Sickbay while he was searching for the cure – keeping him updated on the patients' conditions, running tests for him as he needed them, getting equipment ready and running, delivering his orders on how to adjust treatment to the attending doctors. She would have thought it impossible before, but McCoy was working both things at once, the search for the cure as well as the handling of treatment for the injured. He only left the small sickbay lab when a patient's condition required him to, yet at all times he was aware of the status of all the sick Henonians under his care.

It was fascinating to watch, and it scared her.

Because with everything going on in his mind, McCoy forgot to look out for himself. And if all Christine could do to help him in his research was run errands for him, she made it her personal task to look out for the doctor. McCoy didn't leave Sickbay even at mealtimes, so Christine brought him food, and she made him strong coffee when she found him yawning and rubbing at his eyes. It were small things compared to what McCoy was doing, she knew that. But that and caring for the patients after the doctor's orders were all she was able to offer.

The duty roster was completely thrown over by this course of events. With the large number of patients, everybody was pulling double shifts with half a shift of rest in between before the next double shift. Their life started to revolve around the treatment of patients and the little hours of exhausted sleep in between.

McCoy didn't leave Sickbay once during those first two days. He caught naps on the cot in his office, and once Christine caught him nodding off right there at his table in the lab, but even with all those moments counted together he still didn't get more than maybe two hours of sleep during that time.

It was worth it in the end, or at least so it seemed.

An antigen McCoy synthesized out of uninfected Henonian liver cells (or rather, cells from the organ that would be a liver if it was located in a human body) killed the parasites and flushed them out of the system if combined with two rounds of a particular radiation treatment. And all it had taken to find it had been two sleepless days and over fifty failed experimental setups. A small price to pay for a cure.

Synthesizing enough of the antigen to treat all those Henonians who had fallen ill would take another two days, at the very least. And each patient would have to be put through the radiation cycles one after another, so the absolutely earliest point at which they'd be through treating all Henonians would be in five days.

The High Priest and Council of Elders down on the planet were refusing to let the Captain and Lieutenant York go before every single one of their people had been cured of the illness. And the Henonians' condition was deteriorating fast.

Two days of research and five days of treatment meant one week of captivity for Kirk and York. But never once during that time did Christine get the feeling that McCoy was thinking about that. In fact, she had the feeling that McCoy refused to think about the Captain at all. She had no idea what reserves McCoy was drawing from, but thoughts of rescuing the Captain by what he was doing didn't seem to be on that list.

Kirk wasn't allowed to communicate with the Enterprise while in captivity. Only once a day did the Henonians allow a short audio conference to the bridge as proof that the Captain and the young Lieutenant were still alive. These regular signs of life were a short moment of relief for the entire crew each morning. Even though these calls happened at a pre-scheduled time, McCoy never once left Sickbay for the bridge when the time for those calls rolled around.

And somehow, Christine understood.

Whatever else was going on between them, the Captain was McCoy's best friend. It was one thing to hold that friend's life in his hands directly when treating an injury. Being responsible for his friend's wellbeing from a distance, only able to save it by saving dozens of others, was a whole different level of pressure entirely.

So Christine couldn't begrudge McCoy for obviously pushing those thoughts out of his mind.

Seven days.

On the fourth day, the first Henonians started to turn critical, and from that moment on all bets were off.

While the medical team kept on working as hard as they could on emergency rotations, McCoy started running himself into the ground. Aside from a few small breaks to grab some sleep, or a shower and a change of uniform, the doctor remained in Sickbay, and no amount of discussion could make him leave. He ate when somebody, mostly Christine, forced him to, conferred with Spock about the status of the containment field on the planet, advised M'Benga and the attending nurses on medication dosages and course of treatment.

Never once did he ask about the Captain.

The hours and shifts were blurring into one another as they struggled to keep the patients alive, scheduling treatment according to severity of the infection, juggling medications that had been developed for known humanoid species and trying to find just the right dosage to help the Henonians without accidentally killing them. Because there was one thing they all knew, though they kept it buried in the backs of their mind – should just one of he Henonians die while under their care, their Captain and Lieutenant York would be lost.

Christine had long ago given up thinking. She was merely following instructions, treating patients when she knew what to do, and referring to McCoy when she didn't. She functioned, a small wheel in this whole desperate machine designed to save lives on both sides of this huge cultural misunderstanding.

The first Henonians responded to treatment by the end of the fourth day.

The containment field on the planet was stable and working by the sixth day.

At the beginning of beta shift on the eighth day, the last of the Henonians had been declared free of the microorganism, healed and healthy and ready to be beamed back planetside.

Christine had been exhausted from work many times before in her life, but it had never been this all-encompassing, numb exhaustion that had taken hold of her now. She was inwardly contemplating the choice of returning to her quarters versus just lying down in one of the vacated biobeds right here in Sickbay when Uhura opened a channel to the Henonian leaders. It was the call they had been so desperately working for over the past days, the one that would tell the Henonians that all their people had been healed and the sickness had been contained planetside. It was the call that would get them back their Captain, and the young Lieutenant. The call was broadcast into Sickbay to let the medical team know if they were going to be required at the transporter platform.

The Henonians' answer to Spock's demand to release their men now that all the Henonians' conditions had been met was short, and to the point.

_Bring a gurney._

After days of hard, grueling physical work which would have driven most other men to the point of exhaustion and beyond, McCoy's reaction to the transmission was instinctive and immediate – he grabbed a tricorder and all but ran from the room.

Christine followed as fast as she could, M'Benga and another nurse with the requested gurney in tow, but they couldn't keep up with the CMO. By the time they arrived in the main transporter room, Mr. Scott was already in the process of beaming, and McCoy stood to the side of the platform, tricorder at the ready and a worried frown on his face.

Maybe it was due to the timing of their arrival, or maybe because for the past week Christine had done nothing but deferred to McCoy, making him the focus of her attention even more than he normally was, but she wasn't looking at the transporter platform when two figures began to materialize there. When the two shapes, one leaning heavily onto the other for support, solidified, and when it became clear that Kirk was the one doing the supporting, carrying nearly all of a nearly unconscious York's weight, Christine was looking right at McCoy.

The shift was so obvious she asked herself how anyone else in the room could have missed it. Where there had been tension all over his body, with the appearance of an apparently unharmed Jim Kirk suddenly all that seemed to drain out of the doctor. Rigidness turned into relief. McCoy was nowhere near relaxation yet, but it seemed now that Kirk was back, whatever had kept McCoy strung up for those endless hours and days had vanished. Physical injuries he could deal with directly, that was something he was used to. Trying to keep the Captain alive from a distance was not. Christine understood that, and it didn't come as a surprise for her.

It was the look in McCoy's eyes that made Christine stop short like she had just been sucker-punched in the stomach.

As he watched Kirk rematerialize, McCoy seemed to go through a whole week's worth of worry, fear, possibilities, worst case scenarios and mental anguish. Everything he had held back in order to keep functioning suddenly flowed over, right there for everyone to see, and it made the breath catch in Christine's throat.

Nobody other than her seemed to notice. She wasn't even sure McCoy knew how much his face was giving away of what was going on in his mind during these seconds as the Captain returned to his ship.

But she saw it.

It wasn't something she could put into proper words, not even if she had had the time to think about it as suddenly everyone in the room seemed to tear themselves out of their stupor and rushed forward.

But it had been there, and it scared her.

During those few seconds when nobody had been watching, McCoy hadn't bothered to hide what he was feeling, exhaustion and relief tearing the mask right away from the raw emotions buried underneath.

And it hadn't been the expression on the face of someone who was glad that his friend had returned unharmed. There had been a far deeper emotion displayed in those hazel eyes for those few moments, one which no friendship, no matter how close, was ever able to achieve. Whatever McCoy felt for Kirk, it wasn't platonic comradeship, Christine mused as she joined the rush to help unload Kirk of York's weight, barely listening to the Captain's tired voice saying something about a bad reaction to the food the younger man had suffered. Whatever had happened down there, there were enough stains on both men's uniforms to show that it hadn't been a pleasant experience, and there'd be time for details later.

McCoy was at Kirk's side now, all business and the mask back in place, even though his hand was unusually gentle and careful as he guided the Captain down from the platform. But Christine couldn't forget what she had seen, couldn't help but try and interpret each word and touch with the sudden knowledge inside her head.

McCoy loved Kirk.

If she had ever been sure of something, she was sure of that now, after seeing the look in his eyes.

At some point, friends with benefits had turned into something more for him, and Christine felt her heart bleed at the thought even as she followed McCoy's gruff order, took the Captain's free arm and started guiding him to Sickbay despite his loud protests.

Causal sex might not harm a friendship, but love was another matter entirely. Although this explained why McCoy had let himself in for those secret trysts whenever time allowed it, even if it went against everything Christine thought she knew about the man. People did many things out of love, even those they wouldn't normally do. Now it finally made sense, and she could not help but worry.

If Kirk was aware of how McCoy felt about him, he didn't let it on. Already he was joking again, complaining to the doctor about the lack of hospitality and entertainment during his stay on the planet. He was talking like it had been a damn holiday ending up below expectations. It angered Christine how much it belittled all the worry and the hard, at times _desperate_ , work that had been put into keeping the Henonians alive so that the Captain could live.

No, Kirk wouldn't talk like that if he had any inkling as to what McCoy must have been through over the course of the past week, and Christine was sure he most certainly wouldn't talk like that if he shared his best friend's feelings.

She couldn't help but worry, mind only half on the task as she helped maneuver Kirk onto the nearest biobed as soon as they entered Sickbay. Worry what was going to happen as soon as this whole thing started crashing down on them. And there was no doubt left in her mind that it would crash down on them at one point, sooner or later.

Kirk was a flirt, and a tease. He had _casual_ written all over him, and the only time he had ever committed himself was, as far as Christine was aware, to the Enterprise and her crew.

McCoy on the other hand was all about commitment. Marriage, albeit a failed one. A child. Dedication to his work. Friendships that outlasted all crisis – and with Kirk, there surely had been a few of those.

It were two worlds that just didn't combine outside of friendship. Certainly not in casual sex whenever they felt overcome with lust for it. Not in the long run, at least.

Kirk kept on babbling all through McCoy's examination, constantly attempting to shift focus away from himself and to Lieutenant York, although the latter was in the capable hands of doctor M'Benga. Christine couldn't say she had any objections when McCoy wordlessly reached for a hypospray and injected it into the Captain's neck before he had a chance to duck away. He'd be quiet when sedated, and maybe then Christine's mind would finally give it a rest and fall silent, too.

It would all be in uproar soon enough, anyway. Once this whole thing between Kirk and McCoy blew up in their faces, the uproar would be enormous, and the entire ship was going to be caught in the fallout.

But those were worries better thought of later. Right now, they had an unconscious Captain to examine and a week of sleep to catch up on. Everything else, Christine thought, would just have to wait.

 


	6. +1

**_+1_ **

 

Christine wished that this away mission had been nothing like another glorified camping trip. She'd gladly spend another night, or five, or even ten, with too little sleep on an uncomfortable Starfleet-issue sleeping mat while roots and stones were digging into her painfully from below. Hell, she'd sleep in a tent for the rest of their five-year mission if it only made this whole mess undone.

But Christine had already understood that the one away mission she had been part of had been anything but ordinary, at least as far as the Enterprise was concerned.

Not all missions went wrong, of course. But it were those that ended in blood and pain that stuck to memory, not the ones that went smoothly and successfully, uncomfortable sleeping arrangements notwithstanding.

Christine had seen a number of away missions go wrong over the past sixteen months that she had served on Enterprise. Some of them had ended worse than others. This one? This one was bad.

 _Very_ bad.

She hadn't been there, maybe that was what made it all so much worse when the severity of the situation caught up with Christine. All she had known beforehand was that they had intercepted a distress signal. It came from an Andorian freighter, on an old but still valid Federation frequency, and as the only ship within sensor range the Enterprise had responded to the call. The freighter did not respond to repeated hailing, but the distress signal had requested immediate medical help, and scans had shown a number of fading life forms on board.

The life forms were too weak to get a transporter lock on them, so there had only been one possible reaction to the distress call. An away team had taken a shuttle and boarded the freighter. The Captain had been part of it, as had been Lieutenant Sulu, a security detail, and doctor McCoy.

There had been so many away mission constellations similar to this one before, Christine hadn't even thought much about it. For all appearances, it had seemed like a simple help and rescue mission. She was off duty during that shift, anyway, so she hadn't bothered with too many details. She'd get the necessary information with the beginning of her next shift if there were any medical cases, and the past few days had been busy. She needed to get some rest.

She had barely slept for an hour when the red alert sounded and Spock's voice calmly called all personnel to Battlestations. Immediately wide awake with her heart beating fast in her chest, Christine hurriedly got dressed and had just left her quarters towards Sickbay when suddenly the ship rocked with the impact of weapon fire against the shields. Somebody was firing at them, and Christine sprung into action.

Nobody was loitering in the corridor, or merely walking along. Everyone Christine met on her way was hurrying determinedly and purposefully to their designated stations, just like she was. Passing a comm unit, she heard an emergency call for a medical team to report to Shuttlebay. She immediately contacted Sickbay, but M'Benga assured her that he and two nurses were already on their way there.

Christine still wasn't really worried as she continued on to Sickbay to prepare everything for the reception of the injured Andorians. Red alert and Battlestations had been sounded before. It could all be over in a matter of minutes. Right now she had to focus on her job, and the possible injuries she might have to treat.

That was what she still thought this was about. They had set out to rescue Andorians, and those blasts that had hit the ship hadn't been strong enough to break through their shields. It was unlikely that anybody on board had gotten hurt by them. So the away team must have requested the medical team for treating the injured Andorians.

Arriving at Sickbay, Christine immediately started the preparations. She pulled up Starfleet's medical files on Andorian anatomy, mentally going through the list of medication they were going to need, and what other things needed to be considered when treating Andorians. They had the necessary medication and equipment to deal with most cases of traumatic injuries, and she could only hope that the situation wasn't as bad as the sudden urgency and the red alert suggested.

Nothing could have prepared Christine for the real emergency.

None of her training, no previous emergencies, nothing she had seen before compared to the absolute shock that coursed through her when the doors to Sickbay swished open and M'Benga appeared, hurrying beside the gurney that the nurses were wheeling along. M'Benga had both his hands pressed tightly over a badly bleeding injury, pushing down on the body of the unmoving, wounded person below. Christine immediately recognized the sense of urgency to the situation. And in any other situation, her own professionalism would have immediately kicked in and made her respond to it.

Right now, Christine could only stare, for the first time in her life too shocked by the sight of a medical emergency to do anything about it.

There was blood _every_ where. On the gurney, on the sheets and soaking through the compresses. M'Benga's hands were covered with it, and with a sudden lurch of her stomach Christine realized that the doctor wasn't applying pressure to a wound, but that one of his hands was actually buried _inside_ the wound, holding something together from within the body to stop the flow of blood.

Christine had been ready to treat exhausted and possibly injured Andorians. She hadn't even considered serious injuries to one of their own on this mission. And whatever she had expected, Christine found that she was absolutely unprepared for the sight of this carnage.

Kirk.

That was her first thought. If anybody got hurt on away missions, it was always Kirk. It was some kind of universal law, or as McCoy put it, a design to make him go grey prematurely.

Only, this time it wasn't the Captain who was lying on that gurney, pale and bleeding out. Kirk was hurrying along beside it, eyes fixed on M'Benga's hands in gruesome and frightened fascination but he was up and walking, not injured, bleeding and unconscious.

There was no doubt, not for a single second, to the identity of the injured man on the gurney. Despite the paleness, the ashen features and the frantic movement of the gurney, Christine had immediately recognized him. But her brain refused to realize what her eyes were seeing, even as the nurses hurriedly rolled the gurney in the direction of the surgical bay and M'Benga started barking out orders without ever once looking up from where his hands were holding together what had been forcefully torn apart.

"Whitmore, Hernandez, prep him for surgery. I need a stasis field around him, stat! We need to get this bleeding under control right now. Chapel, get Elverson down here and then take care of the Captain."

And then they were gone, the doors of the surgical bay swishing closed behind the gurney with an ominous pneumatic hiss, blocking the medical team and McCoy's lifeless body from view. Suddenly, Christine was alone in the main room of the Sickbay, feeling every bit as if the floor had just been pulled out from under her feet.

Well, not entirely alone. The Captain had been left outside the surgical bay as well, although he was still standing right in front of the doors, staring at them as if he was still able to make out what was going on through the opaque glass inlay of the doors. His posture was rigid, all his muscles tense, and his breaths were coming in short, panted gasps that bordered on hyperventilation.

His hands, Christine noticed with a sudden lurch of her stomach, were covered in blood, much like M'Benga's had been. Just as if he had been the one to try and stop McCoy from bleeding out before M'Benga had taken over.

_Take care of the Captain._

She had been given an order, and that thought finally tore her out of her stupor. Christine hurried over to the nearest comm unit and contacted Elverson's quarters. The young doctor was a junior member of the medical team who didn't yet have enough experience to run shifts on his own. But he was already shaping out to be an excellent surgeon, and the thought that M'Benga was asking for him to be there during the surgery on McCoy was not a good sign.

But Christine forced those thoughts from her mind. As shocking as McCoy's injuries were, he was being taken care of right now. There was nothing Christine could do for him. But Kirk was still standing rooted to the same spot, breathing hard, covered in blood in various places. She had to make sure that he wasn't injured and had merely pushed those injuries aside in the face of McCoy's much more serious ones.

Slowly, Christine approached the Captain, but he showed no reaction to the sound of her steps in the otherwise eerily silent Sickbay. As she got closer, Christine understood why. Kirk might be physically standing here in Sickbay with her now, but she seriously doubted that his mind was entirely there. For the first time since she had joined the team of Enterprise, the Captain scared her.

Kirk was still standing ramrod straight, facing the surgery bay doors, his face as pale as if he was the one suffering from blood loss and not McCoy. But it was the look in his eyes that really got to Christine. The blue eyes were opened wide, unblinking, and there was a look of such unguarded and sheer terror in them that Christine didn't even dare to approach him.

Kirk had all the looks of a scared and cornered animal, and for a second Christine wondered whether he was even really aware of where he was, or of anything other than the fact that one moment his best friend had been bleeding out right in front of him, and now he was gone. Christine wasn't sure what was going to happen if she tore Kirk out of whatever mental place he had retreated to. He was obviously shaken worse than she had ever seen him, and right now she wouldn't put it past him to lash out at her if she did this wrongly.

But she had to approach him somehow, to make sure that he was all right physically if she could already not do anything for his mental state. She'd just have to do it slowly, and carefully.

"Captain?"

Kirk showed no reaction to her hesitant inquiry, so she took yet another step closer to the man and tried again, her voice firmer and a little louder this time.

"Captain Kirk?"

Slowly, Kirk turned his head in Christine's direction, and the expression on his face cleared somewhat, although Christine wasn't too sure she'd call it coherent, or totally aware. She smiled shakily at him, took another step closer and carefully, ever so slowly, raised a hand and put it against the Captain's arm. The muscles underneath her hand were so tense that they trembled under her touch, and Christine gave the arm a slight squeeze before she let go again.

Most of the blood on Kirk, especially that on his hands, seemed to come from McCoy. But there was a wound on his left shoulder that was bleeding steadily. It didn't seem to be a life-threatening injury, but it had to be treated. Preferably before Kirk went into shock, and judged by his detached behavior, that was still a likely possibility.

"Captain, I need you to sit down."

Kirk kept on staring at her for a second or two, then he gave a barely perceptible nod and allowed Christine to lead him over towards the nearest biobed. It was a lot less resistance than she had ever seen Kirk put up against medical treatment, but right now it didn't even warrant a reaction. Christine had a patient to take care of, and a CMO to worry about once she was done with that. One thing after another. Right now, she needed to focus on one thing at a time, and not falling apart was the first thing on that list.

She pulled out a medical tricorder and slowly ran it over Kirk's body, from head to toe, forcing her hands to go calmly through the motions that she had performed so often before. All she had to do was _not_ think about McCoy, and whether or not M'Benga was losing the desperate battle to save his life at this very moment. Her hands shook less if she forced those thoughts away and focused on getting the job at hand done as professionally as she could.

The scan showed that Kirk had suffered some bruising and a few lacerations that could have come from any kind of altercation or fall, or maybe even a bumpy shuttle ride while dodging weapon fire. Nothing serious to them. But there was a wound in Kirk's left shoulder that was the source of the bleeding Christine had noticed. If pressed, she'd guess it was a wound caused by some sort of projectile. It was a graze, nothing too serious, but the Captain was losing blood and it needed to be taken care of before infection set in.

"I need you to take off your shirt." Christine said, and the best indicator that something was seriously wrong was when those words weren't followed by some form of sexual innuendo on Kirk's part. He merely nodded and shrugged out of the golden fabric of his commander's shirt, wincing as the movement tore at his injured shoulder.

There was some bruising around the wound, but even up close it didn't look too serious. However, cleaning it and then proceeding to mend torn flesh and muscle was work that required Christine's attention for a few minutes. And a few minutes during which she didn't have to think about the _how_ , _why_ and _what ifs_ was something Christine was grateful for.

Kirk for his part silently sat there and endured the treatment, without any of his usual complaints and insistences that he was fine. He winced a little as Christine disinfected the wound, but then stoically sat there and didn't move as Christine proceeded to close the wound and ran a dermal regenerator over it to close the skin. Treatment took maybe ten minutes, and never once during that time did Kirk avert his eyes from the doors separating them from surgical bay.

"You need to take it easy with that shoulder for a little while, but it should heal without any problems. I'll give you something for the pain."

Kirk only nodded, not moving even as Christine picked up a hypospray and pressed it against his neck. Christine was as gentle as possible as she pressed the plunger and injected the medication, and Kirk didn't even flinch as the hypospray discharged in his neck.

Well, now there was a first, but nothing was farther from her mind right now than commenting on it. There was a time for banter, and while the Captain was normally always open for a little levity, right now definitely was one of the few times when it seemed more than inappropriate.

"I should get back to the bridge."

Kirk's voice was hoarse, and despite his words made no move to get up from the biobed and leave Sickbay. He didn't even turn his head as he spoke. Christine was glad that she didn't have to fight Kirk on this, especially since she was convinced that the Captain was in no shape to be anywhere other than under medical surveillance right now. Commandeering a starship was completely out of the question.

"You just take a couple of minutes, Captain. The pain medication might make you drowsy, too, so I want you to take it easy."

Again, Kirk nodded.

"How long is this going to take?"

He nodded his head in the direction of the door behind which McCoy had vanished earlier, as if he was hesitant to either speak out McCoy's name, or what was happening to him right now.

And Christine didn't know what to say. She had only caught a glimpse of McCoy earlier, and didn't know anything about his condition other than that he had lost a lot of blood. His injuries were serious, that much was obvious, but she had no idea how serious. Theoretically she could access the information from the surgical bay's biobed from outside if she wanted to, but found herself hesitant to do so. She was too afraid of what she was going to see if she did. If there was bad news, she didn't want to know it, let alone be the bearer of it. So instead she did what she normally hated doing – she got evasive.

"I don't know, Captain. It will probably be a while. But doctor McCoy is in the best hands."

Kirk shook his head, a sad smile playing around the corners of his mouth.

"Not the best."

It took Christine a moment to catch up on what he meant. Once she did, she had to smile despite the situation.

"You're probably right. But I'm going to let you in on a little secret now, Captain. There's no shame coming in second best when compared to doctor McCoy. M'Benga is a damn good doctor, and McCoy wouldn't have him on the team if he wasn't. I know that McCoy trusts him implicitly, and you should, too."

Kirk nodded, slowly, but without the ultimate bit of conviction.

"I know," he said, running his hand over his face tiredly. "I know that he's good. It's just…" Kirk shook his head tiredly, ending that particular train of thought before he could really finish it. Christine feared that silence was going to settle between them if Kirk stopped speaking, and she was fairly sure that she'd not be able to handle waiting in silence very well. So she just blurted out the first ting that came to mind, even though it turned out to be exactly the wrong thing to say.

"What happened on that freighter?"

Kirk looked startled for a second, as if he had expected anything but this particular question. Christine found herself taking a physical step back, raising her hands in a placating manner.

"I'm sorry, it's none of my business."

Kirk shook his head. "No, it's not that. We just fell for the oldest trick in the book, and I didn't notice a damn thing."

Kirk was shivering slightly, whether from the memory or from the fact that he was still sitting there without a shirt, Christine didn't know. But she walked over towards one of the supply closets and pulled out one of the generic black Starfleet-issue shirts that were stored there. Handing it to Kirk, she tried to keep her tone neutral.

"What happened to the Andorians? Why did they attack?"

Kirk took the shirt with a shake of his head and struggled into it. "There were no Andorians. Just pirates who had taken over the freighter, months ago or even longer. That's why the distress signal came on an old frequency. I should have known something was wrong the moment Uhura said it was unusual."

Christine drew breath to say something, tell the Captain that it hadn't been his fault. Because she knew it hadn't been. Kirk worried about the safety of his crew, far more than about his own at most times. It was something doctor McCoy grumbled about without end, and something she knew to be true from what she had seen of the man in action. But Kirk gave her no chance to get even the smallest words of consolidation in between his bout of self-accusation.

"I don't even know what species they were. Not a really technologically advanced one, that's all I know. Advanced well enough to use the freighter's sensors to show us some false readings on how many life forms were on the freighter, but that seemed to be about it. They jumped us just a few minutes after we boarded the freighter. I…"

Kirk drew a deep breath and bit his lip for a second before he continued. "They took a shot at Bones before I knew what was happening. He just dropped, I couldn't even push him out of the way. One moment he was standing right next to me, the next there was a flash and he went down. It wasn't a phaser, but some sort of projectile weapon. Who the hell still even uses those?"

Christine had no answer to that, but at least that explained the severity of doctor McCoy's injuries. A phaser might have wreaked just as much damage, but the heat of the shot also cauterized wounds, a small fact which at times actually upped the chance for survival.

"I should have pushed him out of the way. Hell, I should have been the one in his position. Injured Andorians or not, we should have secured the area first before sending in medical personnel."

"And you know just as well as I do that that's not the way things always work. You relied on sensor readings, and when those readings told you that the people on board that freighter were in critical condition you did what you thought was right. Doctor McCoy wouldn't have gone if he had thought anything was wrong, either. And you brought him back to the Enterprise alive, which, judged by what I saw earlier, was no small feat."

Kirk paled, staring down at his hands as if for the first time noticing the blood on them.

"He was bleeding out, and they were still shooting at us. We barely got him into the shuttle under the constant fire."

If the shoulder wound was any indication, Kirk had started neglecting the worry about his own safety somewhere along the way of the rescue. Probably right the moment he had seen McCoy drop. But in the end Kirk and the rest of the away team had managed to bring McCoy back to the Enterprise alive. McCoy had still been alive by the time M'Benga had wheeled him into surgical bay. That was what mattered most. Everything else Christine would worry about when the time came.

The same couldn't be said for Kirk, and Christine understood. At least she thought she did. It was probably a lot harder to push everything that had happened away for Kirk, who had been there to see McCoy get hit by that projectile, who had held his hands over the wound in an attempt to stop the flow of blood. It was always harder giving up the responsibility for a life once you had held it in your hands.

"I should get back to the bridge. I need to brief Spock on what happened, make sure that those pirates don't cause any more damage."

The words still lacked conviction, just like the first time Kirk had said them. And really, Christine could understand why. No more blasts had rocked the ship aside from that single shot earlier, so while she was no expert on warfare she guessed that the pirates had been taken care of one way or another. And Spock had Sulu and the other members of the away team to brief him on what happened. There was no need for Kirk to be up on the bridge right now, and if his presence had been required they would have already called for him.

Kirk seemed to think along those lines as well, at least on a subconscious level. Christine seriously doubted that there was anything he was consciously thinking of other than his best friend and what was happening behind the doors to the surgical bay right now. He still made no move to get up and follow through on his words, and Christine knew that Kirk wasn't going to voluntarily leave Sickbay until he knew what was going to happen to McCoy. It was only his sense of duty that was still warring with the decision to stay and wait for the outcome of the surgery. And while Christine could do nothing to influence what was happening behind those doors on the other side of the room, she could at least help the Captain with his decision.

She pointed over towards the sink and decon unit against the back wall of the room. One run through the sterilizing and cleaning unit should get rid of the blood on the Captain's hands.

"Why don't you clean up a little and let me handle this."

Kirk seemed a little wary, but Christine didn't give him any chance to disagree with her. Walking over towards the neared communication console, she pressed the button to hail the bridge.

"Chapel to Commander Spock."

The answer was immediate, and betrayed no emotion in either its tone or infliction.

_"Spock here."_

Christine drew a deep breath, trying to steel herself for what she was about to do. She had never had much interaction with the First Officer before, she only knew that appealing to human traits like understanding and compassion would fall on deaf ears in the face of logic. She'd just have to leave no room for discussion.

"Captain Kirk sustained injuries that significantly limit the movement of his entire left side. In addition to that, the medication he has been given is impairing his coherency. He's unfit to commandeer a starship in his current condition, and I'm taking him off duty until further notice."

There was a moment of silence, interrupted only by the rapid beating of Christine's heart. Spock's voice, when he next spoke, still betrayed no emotion, although Christine thought she detected a hint of surprise in its tone.

_"It would be advisable in consideration of the current condition if the Captain were present on the bridge."_

"And it would not be advisable in consideration of his physical condition if he were anywhere but under constant medical surveillance."

Christine hoped and prayed that the Vulcan would just give it a rest. Because yes, she had quite embellished the extend of Kirk's injuries, even though the basic facts remained the truth. She didn't doubt that Kirk was physically able to take command right now if he had to, but it was painfully obvious that his mind wasn't ready to be focused on anything but McCoy's condition. She should have known that Spock wasn't able to just shut down his Vulcan logic.

_"You are aware of course that only a senior member of the medical staff has the authority to take the commanding officer off duty."_

Christine knew that a friendship born out of mutual respect had grown between Kirk and his First Officer over the course of the past year. Spock's words probably hadn't been meant as hurtful and inconsiderate as they came across, but she could not help but feel her anger flare upon hearing them. And she most certainly couldn't keep the venom from creeping into her voice.

"I am very well aware of this regulation, Commander. If you insist, I will call doctor M'Benga to confirm my assessment. I'm sure that he will not mind interrupting the emergency surgery he is currently performing on doctor McCoy in order to avoid a violation of protocol. But in the absence of doctors McCoy and M'Benga, I am the member of the medical staff with the most seniority, and in my professional assessment Captain Kirk is unfit for duty. However, if you insist, I can patch this communication through to surgical bay to get the appraisal of someone with a _doctor_ in front of his name."

Christine knew that she had gone a couple of steps too far just now, and that there would be an eventual backlash of those words, especially if the bridge crew had been privy to this conversation. Spock wouldn't be a good first officer if he allowed any random crewmember to talk to him like that, in private or in front of others. But she had seen members of this crew make decisions that didn't go according to protocol numerous times before when the situation called for it, and she hated it when someone disregarded her professional opinion just because she was a nurse, and no doctor. So she couldn't bring herself to care all that much about it right now.

All that mattered was that the words had the desired effect.

_"Of course, Nurse Chapel. If that is your professional assessment of the situation."_

And what wouldn't she give for the ability to read the undertones in Spock's voice, if there were any. Those flat and neutral tones just didn't let anything on about whether or not she had seriously overstepped a line just now.

"It is."

_"Very well. I will debrief the Captain about the mission at a later point. Spock out."_

Christine drew a deep breath and ran a hand through her hair as she stepped away from the comm unit. She had just made a decision and justified it in front of the first officer based on an authority she wasn't quite sure she possessed – and she didn't feel bad about it. Not when she looked back at Kirk. The Captain was sitting on the biobed again, legs dangling off the edge. However, his hands were clean now and devoid of any of McCoy's blood. Kirk wasn't looking at her directly, but there was no denying the fact that the hard lines of tension in his shoulders had receded somewhat, which was all the confirmation she needed to know that he had heard every word of her conversation with the First Officer. And seeing that sign of lessening tension, no matter how minute it was, convinced Christine that stepping out of line had been worth it. It seemed Kirk inspired rebellious behavior in his subordinates, even in those who didn't work directly under him.

"Thank you." He said sincerely as Christine stepped back up to the bed.

"Don't worry about it. Just act as if you're in pain should Spock come down here, that should cover our bases. Besides, I wasn't lying. The pain medication I gave you is bound to make you a little drowsy, and it wouldn't be advisable to let you take command under these circumstances."

Kirk frowned at her.

"When did you give me anything?"

Christine frowned, surreptitiously pulling out her tricorder again and scanning the Captain's head once more. She had given him the injection just a few minutes ago, if he had already forgotten about that it could be a sign of a concussion or other head injury she might have overlooked in her earlier examination. But the scan showed no sign of traumatic head injury.

"I gave you the injection with the painkiller right after I treated your shoulder wound. Don't you remember?"

Kirk rubbed the right side of his neck, as if trying to conjure up memories of the pain of the injection.

"I didn't feel anything."

A fleeting smile stole over Christine's face.

"Contrary to popular belief, hypospray injections can actually be painless."

Kirk shook his head. "Between Bones and you, I would have never guessed. Seriously. I know he's doing it on purpose…"

Kirk stumbled over his words as if he didn't quite know how to continue his sentence. It was a well-known fact on board that the doctor wasn't always too gentle in his medical treatment of the Captain, as if each hypospray was a lesson he wanted Kirk to learn. But given the current circumstances, Christine couldn't fault Kirk for stumbling across what would have normally been the friendly recounting of an annoying but harmless habit. She decided that this called for a little distraction.

"What, and you thought I was merely incompetent?"

Kirk laughed. "No. I know that Bones wouldn't have asked for you specifically to be part of the medical team if you were. I thought it was plain old dislike."

Christine didn't know whether to laugh or to be upset about this statement. Her response came out as something between a chuckle and a surprised gasp.

"What?"

Kirk looked up, his blue eyes boring into Christine's.

"I thought you had something against me. I know I rub people the wrong way sometimes. You wield a mean hypospray, nurse Chapel, just in case nobody ever told you that before."

And yes, Christine openly admitted that she hadn't always been the most careful when injecting Kirk with medication. It had been her own personal (and harmless) payback for what he and McCoy had unknowingly put her through over the past months. She was only human, she couldn't always separate professional and private life. It just didn't work when her patients were the very same people she worked and lived with day in day out. A starship wasn't that big a place once you lived there for a while. However, she would have never thought that anything in her behavior could have been seen as an indication of dislike towards the Captain.

"It wasn't that. I just…I tend to get protective."

The words had tumbled out before Christine could think about them. Once she heard them, in her own voice so that there was no doubt left that she had really just blurted this out, she immediately wished she had just shut up for once in her life. Something shifted in Kirk's gaze at the words, and he regarded her with a slight frown on his face.

"Protective?"

Christine felt a blush creep on her face, and she quickly averted her gaze, busying herself with putting away the medical equipment she had used earlier. But Kirk wasn't known for giving up easily, especially not when the particular conversation was the only thing distracting him from brooding of a much darker nature.

"Protective of what? Or who?"

Christine still didn't answer. She didn't know how to, not without giving away that she knew far more about the relationship between the Captain and his CMO than she was willing to admit.

"Just forget about it," Christine mumbled, closing the last drawer and brushing away some nonexistent lint from her uniform sleeve. Anything not to look in the Captain's direction right now. But Kirk, for all his usual levity and nonchalant ways, was very clever. The fact that he had become the youngest Starfleet Captain in history should be proof enough of that. He kept on looking at Christine until she couldn't help but give in and meet his gaze, even though she knew that a very vivid blush was still covering her cheeks. And suddenly, not talking seemed like an even worse alternative, even though her previous blunders had already proven that it wasn't a wise choice to continue down this particular path.

"I know he always seems like it all just rolls off of him, but you keep finding ways to go against medical orders, and the doctor…"

Kirk looked at her for a second, his head cocked slightly to the side, until suddenly his eyes widened and he interrupted Christine before she could finish.

" _Bones_? You keep stabbing me with hyposprays because you feel _protective_ of _Bones_?"

Christine didn't know what to respond to that. Frankly, it was the truth. Not just because of how Kirk never followed McCoy's medical advice and how complicated it made life for McCoy. Even more so she felt protective of the doctor because she knew that McCoy loved Kirk, and wasn't too sure that this whole thing could end in anything other than heartbreak.

So really. It wasn't something she wanted to talk about, least of all with the Captain. She tried to think of something to say that would steer the conversation into safer waters, anything, but Kirk just looked at her with that deep gaze. It was the intensity that made Christine wish for a hole to open up and swallow her. Kirk was sitting there, banged up and with his defenses down, and she was the one who felt strangely naked under that gaze. Kirk kept scrutinizing her as if he was trying to figure something out, but suddenly he reeled back, his eyes widening to a degree that would have been comical under any other circumstances.

While Christine was still trying to figure out what had just happened, Kirk broke the gaze, letting his head sink down with a sigh. His voice, when he spoke again, was tired, and sounded more resigned than surprised.

"Oh god. You know, don't you?"

Christine didn't know what she could possibly respond to that. This was the point where they could start dancing around the whole issue, talking about it without ever putting a name to it. It would leave the backdoor open, a way out to potentially awkward moments. But Christine was too tired to keep track of what she could say and what she had to keep to herself anymore. Kirk had opened that particular door, so he could not blame her for walking through it.

"About doctor McCoy and you? Yes, I know."

And it was astounding how so few so simple words could lift a weight off Christine's shoulders. There could have been a hundred different scenarios during which she would have preferred to reveal her knowledge, and given the choice she might have chosen never to talk about it at all, but now it was out there, and the ball was in Kirk's court.

And his reaction was, as anything about his command style, completely unpredictable.

Kirk looked straight at her for a few beats, then he shook his head and cast his eyes to the floor. And just for a second, when his shoulders started to shake, Christine thought that he might be breaking down right in front of her. The confusion lasted for just a short moment, then Christine realized that Kirk was actually _laughing_.

Not a full-blown bout of mirth, but the Captain was definitely laughing, and of all the reactions Christine might have imagined to her revelation, this definitely hadn't been on the list. She felt an irrational surge of anger at the fact that the knowledge that had been weighing so heavily on her for the past weeks and months was nothing but a source of amusement to Kirk, and her voice was unusually sharp when it broke through the silence of the room.

"Care to tell me what's so funny?"

Kirk shook his head again, and when he looked up at Christine there was a slight smile on his face. But it wasn't the kind of smile that reached his eyes, and it actually made his face look more sad than amused.

"Funny? Nothing, really. But Bones was right, and he's going to rub that in incessantly."

At the mention of McCoy, Kirk's face fell again and his eyes darted over to the door of the surgical bay behind which M'Benga was still trying to save the doctor's life. All short-lived levity was gone, and the air in the room suddenly seemed too heavy and oppressing to breathe.

Christine had always defined her job as mainly taking care of physical wounds and ailments. She wasn't really big on this whole comforting others business, but right now she could not stop intervening once more to distract the Captain from thinking about what was going on behind those close doors. And it was somewhat of a selfish act, too, since distracting Kirk also meant that she was distracting herself from what was happening, and anything that pushed off reality for as long as possible right now was a welcome thing in Christine's book.

"Doctor McCoy was right about _what_?"

It took a second or two until Kirk tore his eyes away and looked at her again. His eyes were unnaturally bright, but after a second the mask was back in place and he shot an unconvincing grin at Christine.

"Well, he was convinced that if anybody was clever enough to figure it out, it was you."

"What?"

Normally Christine was far more eloquent than that, but right now she was far too surprised and stunned to think of anything better to say. Kirk only shrugged with another half-grin.

"Besides, now I owe him a bottle of Romulan Ale, so you bet he's not going to miss a single opportunity to rub this in."

And despite herself, Christine had to suppress a laugh, even though her initial urge was to slap Kirk over the head, Captain or not.

"You _bet_ on who was going to figure it out first?"

Kirk cocked his head to the side, and some of the cockiness Christine was so used to seeing on his face returned. And she should have known. If anybody would bet on who was going to reveal his secret sexual exploits, it was James T. Kirk.

"I wouldn't say it was a bet, really. More like Bones grumbling about how it was impossible to keep anything on a starship secret for long, and when I told him he was paranoid, he said just to watch it, someone was going to figure it out sooner or later, and most likely that someone was going to be you. I don't really remember when the bottle or Romulan Ale came into the conversation, but somewhere along the line it did. And it shouldn't really surprise you that Bones thought it was going to be you. He thinks very highly of you. Besides, you spend every other shift with each other, and he knows that you're clever."

Christine didn't really know what to say to that. Honestly, she'd much rather McCoy told her of his high opinion of her than express it through making her his pick in the game of _who's gonna figure it out_. But then again she couldn't complain, because while the doctor wasn't the kind of person to compliment people left and right, she had always been aware of how much she and her professional capacities were appreciated by him. And what he said to Kirk behind closed doors wasn't any of her business – no matter that it had been constantly thrown right in her face over the past couple of months. And honestly, she no longer had any kind of clue as to what she was supposed to think and what not. It was only giving her a headache. So she really couldn't be blamed for her next words, even if they only served to make this bizarre conversation even more surreal.

"You do know, of course, that the possession of Romulan Ale violates Federation law?"

And really, had ever a dumber thing be said? Christine was fairly sure the answer to that was no. And that included the one time Mr. Scott had been calling the warp core 'sweetheart' through an open communications line for all the ship to hear.

Kirk only smiled crookedly. "I really should get acquainted better with all these laws and regulations now that I'm Captain, shouldn't I?"

But then his expression sobered just as quickly as it had turned amused. "How did you notice?"

Christine drew a deep breath. She did not mind this conversation with the Captain. On the contrary, she was actually quite glad for the distraction from the worry about McCoy. But she wasn't too sure if she really wanted to talk about how exactly she had figured out that the friendship between the Captain and McCoy was anything but platonic. She gave a non-committal shrug, but Kirk immediately shook his head.

"Oh no. If I already have to smuggle illegal substances on board, the least you can do is tell me how we got busted."

It was too much. Too personal, too direct, too soon, and hitting far too close to home. To Christine, Kirk had always been her Captain, her distant superior officer, and most of her interaction with him had happened either when he got himself injured, or through his interaction with McCoy. The leap from that to sitting here talking about the details of what she had witnessed was huge, and not necessarily one Christine wanted to take. Especially not right now. Besides, Kirk could guess all that very well by himself, there was no need for Christine to fill in the details. It wasn't as if there were that many options on how she could have found out.

"Not much to tell, Captain."

"Jim," Kirk immediately corrected, not reacting to the confused look Christine shot him. "You took me off duty, remember? I'm not the Captain right now."

"Not much to tell." Christine repeated, deliberately leaving out any way of addressing him this time around. Because there was no way she'd start calling the Captain by his first name just out of the blue. Especially not since the sole reason for this first real conversation they had was that they both needed something to distract them from their mutual worry about McCoy.

Kirk raised an eyebrow, a gesture strangely reminiscent of his First Officer, although there was a portion of amusement behind it that Spock would forever lack.

"Really? Come on, you want to tell me you just sat down one day, thought about it and figured out what was going on between Bones and me?"

"What do you want me to say, Captain? I _saw_ you, how else would I know what's going on between the two of you? I saw you and I'd much rather not go into the details of what I saw, thanks a lot."

It had to be the worry, Christine thought. That was the only explanation. That underlying worry about McCoy, that horrible image of seeing him wheeled into surgical bay, bleeding and looking more dead than alive, must have fried the synapses in her brain responsible for maintaining a respectful, professional tone with her superior officers. There was no other explanation as to why she would snap first at Spock, then at the Captain.

But where Spock had taken it with Vulcan rationality and had probably made a calm mental footnote about reprimanding her for her verbal diarrhea at a later point, Kirk merely smiled at her outburst. When Christine leveled the full force of her glare at him, he at least had the decency to look slightly abashed.

"I'm sorry."

And it sounded sincere, Christine had to give him that. But she was still so inexplicably angry. It wasn't as if Kirk had done something to justify how Christine was feeling right now. He most certainly hadn't asked her to keep walking in on him and McCoy when they were caught up in the throes of passion – although he could have prevented that from happening by keeping his sexual relations confined to his quarters, like everybody else. But while he hadn't forced her to see what she had seen, his insistence to talk about it was even worse. Christine didn't _want_ to talk about it. She didn't want to rehash everything she had seen. For months, she had desperately wished to finally be able to unload some of that particular emotional burden, but now that it was happening she couldn't bring herself to feel grateful for it. She had been bottling up her frustration about seeing Kirk and McCoy together for too long, and it was all spilling over right now.

"Yeah well, that's helping a lot. How about the next time you just keep it to your quarters, then you won't have any reason to be _sorry_ for anything later on. Anybody could have come walking into Sickbay that night instead of me."

Kirk ran a hand over his face. He seemed to know immediately what particular instance Christine was talking about. Or maybe there had just been so many that he didn't think it mattered exactly which of those encounters the nurse had witnessed. Either way, it gave Christine an eerie satisfaction to see that his ears were turning slightly pink in embarrassment.

"Point taken."

He drew a breath to say something else, but Christine was far from finished. It was as if her mouth was on autopilot, all her frustration not bothering to take the long route through her brain as it was finally escaping from the tight coil in her stomach it had been confined to for the past months.

"And just because Shuttlebay is declared out of limits for a shift doesn't mean nobody's going to come walking through there either!"

Kirk's eyes widened, and his mouth opened and closed a few times before he managed to bring out a hoarse syllable.

" _What_?"

"Oh, you heard me. Hearing you in doctor McCoy's office was already more than I asked for, I most certainly didn't want to see _that_ on top of it. Did it ever occur to you that somebody walking through Shuttlebay would wonder where the noise was coming from? That they might go take a look and end up seeing the two in the back of that shuttle?" Again, Kirk drew breath to reply, but Christine cut him off with a quick gesture of her hand.

"Don't answer that. I'm not sure I want to hear. We're not even going to talk about leaving hickeys where all the world can see them, but let me tell you that it's pretty damn distracting. That's a fact. And I don't know what you did during the obligatory Academy outdoor survival training. I don't want to know, really not. All I know is that you didn't learn a single thing about telling which direction the wind is coming from. So maybe you should brush up on some basic skills you might have missed to spare somebody else that particular experience!"

Kirk was staring at Christine in open-mouthed shock. She had seen his expression shift through a couple of emotions during her uncontrolled rant, but it was as if once she had started, there was no stopping it. No matter the consequences for her in the future. It had been like a shuttle gone out of control, and she had been the pilot unable to stop the impeding collision.

Kirk's reaction to her mention of the Shuttlebay incident had been to blush profusely, a sign of an embarrassment she would have previously doubted the Captain to be capable of. When Christine had mentioned the hickey, his hand had unconsciously gone up to the side of his own throat, right to where Christine remembered the bruise on McCoy's neck to have been. It was the reference to his lack of outdoor survival training and his ability to read the wind that had him completely and utterly confused.

"What?"

Anybody else might have reveled in the fact that they had reduced James T. Kirk to repeated one-syllable answers, but Christine didn't really care right now.

"Oh, don't pretend you have no clue what I'm talking about. Judged by what I heard, you can't possibly have forgotten what happened during that scouting mission of the class M planet a few months back. The one where you had an allergic reaction to the pollen carried by the wind? Well, let me tell you that pollen was not the only thing those winds carried, and it was blowing right from your tent towards mine for the entire night."

"Oh god." Kirk had the decency to blush even more deeply before he leaned his face in his hands and rubbed hard, as if trying to wash without water. "Why didn't you say anything?"

Christine snorted, not really knowing what she was supposed to think or feel now that she had finally given in to her anger and let it out.

"And what was I supposed to do? Knock on your tent-flap and ask the two of you to tone it down? Yeah, I can see how that would have gone over well, and without any embarrassment."

Kirk said nothing for a few long seconds. And really, there wasn't anything else to say. Christine had finally let loose all the things that had been bothering her for so long, and she felt herself deflate, her mind detaching strangely from the situation, and from the fact that she had just spent five minutes all but yelling at her Captain. The repercussions to this were going to be epic. Probably Kirk was going to drop her off at the nearest Starbase, if he even waited that long. Probably he was just going to drop her off in an emergency pod somewhere in the vicinity of the next inhabitable planet. And he was going to demote her before he did that for sure. But strangely, she couldn't really bring herself to care about it all that much. She was tired, confused and scared out of her wits, there wasn't any space left for her to be worried about her future employment situation on top of that. Taking a step back, she leaned on the biobed facing Kirk's, looking anywhere but straight at the Captain.

"I'm sorry."

She was startled, but still her movements were hesitant as she slowly raised her head and looked at Kirk. The Captain was looking straight at her, his face no longer flushed with embarrassment, and a strange determination in his eyes.

"It's okay."

It wasn't, not really. But that was all Christine could think of as a reply.

"No, it's not." Kirk shook his head, unconsciously worrying a cuticle with the nails of his right hand. "You shouldn't have kept running into us like that."

Christine shrugged, not really knowing what else to do. Water under the bridge. And in the face of what was happening to McCoy in the surgical bay right now, it really didn't matter at all. She caught Kirk sneaking another look at the closed set of double doors. It was just a quick glance, over in a second, but it was proof that the thought of what had brought them together for this bizarre conversation in the first place was still on the forefront of Kirk's mind.

"After all that, it's no small wonder that you went a little crazy on me with the hyposprays."

Christine frowned, not really following this train of thought.

"What's that supposed to mean? That I'm unprofessional enough to let my personal feelings influence my work?"

And if she was honest with herself, she had allowed just that to happen. Never to the degree that it would have endangered Kirk. Never even close. She'd never put a patient at risk just because she felt personally affronted by them. But that Kirk was calling her out on her little moments of vindictiveness made an indignant voice of protest rise inside of her that didn't want to be quelled. Even more so as Kirk simply shrugged her protests off.

"Well, don't tell me that seeing all that has been easy on you."

"Of course not! I kept running into the two of you having sex – repeatedly. Anybody would be somewhat pissed if that happened them again and again."

"Yeah, but then again not everybody is you."

Christine frowned, completely taken aback. "What's that supposed to mean?"

The mischievous smile was back on Kirk's face, though it lacked any of his usual vigor.

"Come on now, Christine."

Christine? When exactly had they gone from _'nurse Chapel'_ to _'Christine'_ , and why didn't she have a clue about how the hell that had happened? She kept glaring at the Captain until Kirk sighed and shook his head.

"What I mean is that your crush on Bones is about as big as Klingon Space. I'm sure running into us didn't exactly help with that."

"I'm…you…I _what_?"

Yeah. What? That was all Christine's mind was able to come up with. The fact that Kirk grinned at her like the cat that had gotten the proverbial canary? So not helping. Also, he did not quite seem ready to let this go all that easily.

"What, you're saying I'm wrong?"

And Christine had never quite felt caught in the act before, but now she did. And she didn't even know what warranted that feeling. So even if Kirk was right – and Christine was never going to openly admit to that, just for the record. She was a woman, and not a hormonal teenager who developed something as infantile as a _crush_ – it was none of Kirk's damn business. Besides, it had taken her a while to admit to herself that maybe she was more interested in her CMO than she had previously been willing to acknowledge. So how the hell did Kirk think he knew anything about that?

Just because he had women (and admittedly, men and sometimes members of other species, too) swooning around him on a regular basis didn't mean he had any idea about what was going on inside of her. She was a grown woman, she could deal with her feelings for McCoy. That didn't give Kirk any right to throw them back in her face, or expect her to respond to that.

She had every right to be angry. Her feelings for McCoy were none of his damn business.

And despite her flaring anger, Christine knew that she was blushing like a schoolgirl. And wasn't that alone all the confirmation Kirk needed to know that his words had struck a chord? Of course it was, if his smile was any indication.

"Now come on. It's nothing to be ashamed of. Bones is a good looking man. Can be rather charming, too, if he only shuts off the grumbling once in a while. It's not that hard to figure out what you see in him."

Christine wanted to snarl right back that Kirk had no idea whatsoever what she saw in doctor McCoy. And really, after all the speaking up and general showing of disrespect towards superior officers she had already done today, it wouldn't have mattered much. But then another thought dawned on her and with a groan she buried her head in her hands.

"Please tell me that you haven't told doctor McCoy about this."

Kirk laughed and shook his head, but when Christine looked up she found that there was no real mirth in the gaze the Captain leveled at her.

"You don't honestly think that I had to. Bones isn't blind, Christine. He's the one who's working with you on a daily basis, I'd say it was kinda hard for him to miss it even if he had wanted to."

His eyes made another quick dart to look over at the set of double doors separating them from the doctor, and whatever relaxation might have crept into his body language over the course of the past minutes vanished immediately as he tensed. Christine noticed the shift, but her mind was reeling too much with everything that had happened over the past minutes to react to it. She was never, never ever going to be able to look McCoy in the eye again.

"Great. I might want to go look for another job as soon as we hit the nearest Starbase then."

Kirk looked up at her, a frown on his face.

"Why would you want to do that?"

Christine resisted the urge to roll her eyes at him. Somehow, despite all the lines she had already crossed today, that seemed like something one shouldn't do in front of her Captain. No matter that she had seen doctor McCoy do it countless times before. That was different, and obviously so. But Kirk probably wouldn't have noticed an eye-roll of epic proportions right now, he seemed far too confused by Christine's words

"You're kidding, right? How exactly am I supposed to work with doctor McCoy under these circumstances? Or rather, how is he supposed to keep working with me?"

If that even became an issue ever again, a nagging voice in the back of Christine's head interrupted. Because right now, it was far from sure that McCoy would even survive the night, so any thoughts about future working arrangements were useless anyway. McCoy might…there was so much that could go wrong. She had seen that kind of surgery before, had assisted in it more times than she cared to remember. There were a hundred things that could go wrong.

And then nothing would matter, anyway.

Kirk didn't seem willing to let go of this particular point of conversation right now. At until he had made his point, whatever that was.

"It's not as if Bones only figured it out yesterday. To tell you the truth, I think he's kinda flattered, though he'd never admit it. Besides, it didn't affect your working together until now, and as long as it doesn't, I doubt Bones is going to let you leave this ship even if I give the order to have you kicked out."

He laughed, more to himself than as an outward expression of mirth. Whatever private thought was going through the Captain's head at that moment, it was one Christine wasn't privy to. Even when Kirk continued to speak, she wasn't entirely sure that he was still talking to her.

"That's just how he is. He hides behind all that grumbling and the constant complaining, but he cares. He cares too damn much about everything and everyone but himself."

Kirk shook his head again with a weary sigh. Whatever superficial emotions he had displayed during their conversation, it was all gone now, as if he didn't have any strength left to invest in any emotion covering up the soul-deep worry that lay underneath. It was as if for the first time since Kirk had broken out of his earlier reverie that he wasn't even putting an effort into putting up a wall around his feelings.

The shift in the conversation had happened completely unexpectedly, and Christine didn't know how to handle it. She could handle deflection, overplaying real emotions with distracting conversation and banter about something that wasn't actually worth being talked about in the face of what was really going on.

Christine didn't know if she could handle this somber shift. Didn't know if she wanted to, either.

It felt as if there was something she should be seeing, but right now she could barely focus on getting some semblance of order into her thoughts. It was all too much. Too much talking, too many revelations, and her brain simply couldn't keep up with all of that right now.

She didn't know if she was trying to steer the conversation back to where it had been minutes ago with her next words. All she knew was that right now, she couldn't stand the silence.

"For how long?"

Kirk didn't look surprised, or upset that Christine was asking this admittedly very private question. He merely looked at her intently for a few seconds, and Christine got the distinct feeling that his answer wasn't going to be what she'd expect. She would have anticipated a flippant reply, an attempt to divert from the fact that he might not remember when it all started.

But looking into the Captain's face Christine suddenly got the impression that he'd be able to give her a precise account of the exact amount of months, weeks and days, if he only wanted to.

He obviously didn't want to go there, but nevertheless his answer came as yet another surprise.

"Bones and me?" His eyes darted over towards the doors that led into surgical bay, an a second of silence followed before he answered.

He could have said _forever_. Or _for months_. _It doesn't matter_ , or even _it's none of your business_. He could have said anything.

Christine was sure nothing could have hurt as much as what he did say.

"Not so long that we weren't friends first for a long time. Long enough to know that he…" Another glance at the closed doors, followed by a shake of his head. "This can't be how it ends. He can't…he just can't." Kirk's jaw clenched as he swallowed hard, turning away from Christine as if trying to stop her from seeing his face at that moment.

He didn't need to.

It hit her like a blow. In hindsight, their entire conversation had been leading up to this point, but still the realization struck Christine completely out of the blue.

And she couldn't even pinpoint what exactly suddenly made her see it. It might have been the defeated tone of Kirk's voice, or the slump of his otherwise always so proud and straight posture. Most probably though, it was a combination of all that and more, most importantly the unhidden raw pain in his words, and the hitch in his voice at the last words. His expression was pained, as if even imagining the worst outcome hurt too much for him to stand it.

And Christine understood.

She understood that there was more than friendship connecting these two men. No friendship, no matter how close, would cause so much fear, so much pain and heartbreak.

This was more than friendship, on both parts. It wasn't just sex with no strings attached. What Kirk felt for McCoy was on equal footing with the doctor's feelings for him. And it was not something Christine could ever compete with.

She had no idea what to do, let alone think or feel. Her whole perception of what she had seen, or thought she had seen, for the past couple of months shifted and she had no idea what to do about that hole that suddenly opened up inside of her.

Kirk loved McCoy. McCoy loved Kirk.

It sounded so easy, and yet it couldn't be more complicated. Kirk and McCoy loved each other, McCoy was possibly dying, everything was turned upside down, and Christine and her feelings were caught somewhere in the middle. It was all tumbling down around her, and she had no idea how to hold anything together anymore.

"He'll be all right, won't he?"

Startled, Christine looked at Kirk, really _looked_ at him for what seemed like the first time, and was struck by how _young_ the man actually was. Youngest Starfleet Captain was a title that was easily used over and over again, and it lost its meaning after a while. Kirk had more than earned his stripes as a Captain, but it was easy to forget that he was still so very young. He even was two years _her_ junior, and that was something Christine had never consciously contemplated before. His age didn't show while he was on duty; his cocky and self-assured persona hid it well for most of the time. But right now, sitting on the biobed in front of her with his legs dangling off the side, his fingers gripping the edge of the bed tightly, Kirk looked his age, and not a single year older. In fact he looked a lot younger than he actually was.

It were the eyes. They were wide and so incredibly sad as Kirk was looking at her, and they made him look for all the world like a lost and scared little boy waiting for his parents to come pick him up. Worse, underneath all the other emotions his gaze was also hopeful. Kirk hadn't asked that question to get Christine's honest opinion. But no matter how much she wanted to, Christine couldn't help him.

Kirk was asking her for reassurance, and that was the only thing she couldn't give.

She couldn't give him a comforting platitude, and she didn't think Kirk would swallow one of those, anyway. And most definitely she couldn't lie to him and tell him everything was going to be all right. It was simply not in her nature. She was a nurse, not a comforter. She dealt with realities, not with hope.

So Christine did the only thing she could think of – she functioned. She pushed herself off the biobed she had been leaning against and turned towards her desk.

"Grab a chair and come over. I'm going to get you a coffee, we might as well settle for the wait."

It was all she could think of, and while it was hopelessly inadequate, it was simply going to have to be enough.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Four hours.

For four hours Christine and Kirk sat in Sickbay and waited amidst cups of coffee that went un-drunk and conversation that never really picked up again beyond a few words.

For the first time, Christine felt like a stranger in Sickbay. This was where she worked, where she spent most of her waking hours, and ever since joining the crew of the Enterprise she had never felt anything like this before. But right now she was off duty, and there was nothing for her to do but sit and wait. Right now, she wasn't a nurse on staff here. Like Kirk, she was an outsider to what was going on, sitting here and waiting for somebody to deliver the unalterable results.

And so she waited.

When, after four long hours, the doors to the surgical bay opened with the same pneumatic hiss they had so threateningly closed with ages ago, Kirk was out of his chair in a heartbeat. Christine felt her heart pounding a mile a minute in her chest as she followed the Captain and stepped closer to the doctor. M'Benga looked pale and exhausted, sweat plastering his hair to his forehead, and the expression on his face unreadable.

Neither Kirk nor Christine dared to ask the question that was on the forefront of their minds, and it took a moment until M'Benga started speaking unprompted. Christine was sure that the doctor actually wrapped things up in full sentences, but it were only words that penetrated through the sudden haze in her mind.

_Critical blood loss_

_Extensive damage_

_No promises_

_He's hanging on_

It was as if Kirk had only heard the last part of M'Benga's assessment. The moment he heard that McCoy was still alive he seemed to sag in a little on himself. Not much, but a slump in his shoulders, a near-inaudible sigh or relief, a small but not in any way less powerful mimicry of McCoy's reaction to seeing the Captain in the transporter room after he had been held hostage.

McCoy was still alive.

That was something worth holding on to, and for now that seemed to be enough of a purpose to Kirk. When McCoy was brought out of surgical bay a few minutes later and carefully transferred onto a biobed in the main room of sickbay, Kirk was already pulling up a chair beside him.

She should feel on morally high ground, Christine thought as she pulled the privacy curtain closed around the bed. Kirk shot her a small grateful smile, interrupting the focus of his attention on the bed for a small moment to glance up at her before he turned back around to McCoy.

Yes, by all accounts she should feel morally righteous here. Not that there had ever been any real aspirations in her feelings for the doctor. But obviously there was a much stronger connection between McCoy and Kirk than she had ever thought possible. There was love, feelings that her infatuation could not ever compete with. It was the right thing to just forget all about any possible _what ifs_ she might have previously indulged in. Kirk and McCoy loved each other and there was no getting in between. After what she had seen, she had the feeling she could only lose if she tried.

And no mater how rational and reasonable that thought was, it hurt. It hurt badly.

There was nothing she could do to protect herself from that pain but close that curtain around the bed and put some distance between herself and the two men. It would all look better in the morning. And if that wasn't the world's most horrible platitude, Christine had no idea what was.

But sometimes, platitudes turned out to be right. Even horrible ones.

McCoy remained unconscious for the entire night, and most of the following morning. His condition was closely monitored at all times, but Christine thought that not even the biobed's sensitive sensors were a match for the close scrutiny Kirk kept over the unconscious man for the entire time. He didn't leave Sickbay once during the night, and he didn't stray from McCoy's bedside even during the regular examinations M'Benga performed on his patient.

It was as if Kirk was waiting for something, as if that was all that was keeping him here and stopped him from going to his quarters to get some much needed rest. Of course he was waiting for the moment when M'Benga would declare McCoy to be out of danger and stabilized, but in Christine's professional opinion, that was going to take a little longer than Kirk could afford to spend sitting next to the unconscious man's bed.

Christine herself felt like death warmed over, and she had actually gone and gotten some hours of restless sleep over the course of the night. Kirk hadn't so much as closed his eyes, that she was sure of. It wasn't going to take long until M'Benga would stop gently suggesting that the Captain leave to get some rest and would pull his rank as temporary CMO to actually make Kirk leave.

It was approaching noon when it happened. Christine was just making one of her regular rounds to check up on McCoy's condition, and had she done so a minute earlier or later she might have missed it. But she was just checking the monitors above the biobed when McCoy opened his eyes.

The sedatives he had been given for the surgery had worn off a while ago, but nobody had expected for the doctor to wake up before his condition stabilized further.

McCoy didn't wake up, not really. He wasn't really aware, and definitely not entirely coherent. But he opened his eyes for a moment and gazed around the room – tiredly, half-lidded, his eyes glazed over and his gaze unfocused. It was just a couple of seconds. One moment, McCoy tiredly blinked against the glare of the overhead lights. Then his eyes met Kirk's, who had immediately leaned over the bed as soon as he had seen the slight flutter of McCoy's eyelids.

They didn't even say anything. Not Kirk, and definitely not McCoy. They simply looked at each other for the fragment of a moment, then McCoy relaxed and his eyes slowly dropped close as he fell asleep again.

It had been just a few seconds, but looking at Kirk one could think that something monumental had just happened. Kirk caught her gaze and gave a tired smile, and for the first time since this nightmare had started there was no underlying fear or worry in it. Just fatigue, and relief.

And Christine found herself feeling the relief along with the Captain. McCoy was not out of the woods yet, but if Kirk believed he was going to make it, Christine thought she could, too. He was going to need a lot of rest and time for recovery, but she didn't doubt that eventually things were going to turn out all right.

Everything else Christine could deal with when the time came.

 

 

**_The END_ **


End file.
